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College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

voiceofsandiego.org

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Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#291

I see online synchronous 1-2 hour exams as a mistaken result of the "let's emulate in-person teaching in a remote setting" mindset. You don't succeed in remote teaching and learning by trying to make it as close as possible to the in-person setup. You have to treat it as an entirely different problem. Consider the synchronous exam. It is a perfect method of grading in-person. It is hard to cheat and all people take t…

> You don't succeed in remote teaching and learning by trying to make it as close as possible to the in-person setup. You have to treat it as an entirely different problem. I agree at a high level, but practically speaking it's not realistic to expect colleges to completely reinvent their entire teaching systems for a temporary, 1-2 year remote learning period. Now that we've been dealing with COVID for almost an ent…

> Now that we've been dealing with COVID for almost an entire year, it's easy to forget that at one point we thought this would all be over in a matter of weeks or months.

I absolutely agree, but I have to say, I also think it's somewhat bizarre that anyone ever thought that. I know it seemed weird to me at the time.

Where exactly did everyone think the pandemic would go after a few months of lockdown?

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You don't succeed in remote teaching and learning by trying to make it as close as possible to the in-person setup. You have to treat it as an entirely different problem. I agree at a high level, but practically speaking it's not realistic to expect colleges to completely reinvent their entire teaching systems for a temporary, 1-2 year remote learning period. Now that we've been dealing with COVID for almost an ent…

> Now that we've been dealing with COVID for almost an entire year, it's easy to forget that at one point we thought this would all be over in a matter of weeks or months. I absolutely agree, but I have to say, I also think it's somewhat bizarre that anyone ever thought that. I know it seemed weird to me at the time. Where exactly did everyone think the pandemic would go after a few months of lockdown?

> Where exactly did everyone think the pandemic would go after a few months of lockdown?

We thought we'd combine lockdown with tighter quarantines for visitors and excellent test & trace systems with quarantines for people with covid and that we would, like several countries, get covid under control.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#293
post #208
post #201

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> I wonder how parents feel that an anonymous foreign, most probably male, can watch their daughter in her room working on her exams and she can't opt-out else she'll be treated like a criminal. Why does foreign matter?

>Why does foreign matter? No or weak legal recourse in the event of wrongdoing being discovered.

Exactly.

Plus the outsourced entity can just go bankrupt and you'll never hear about it again.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#294
post #151

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Folks are doing take-home exam wrong. Caltech had tremendous success with a culture of honesty and take-home exams.

Most students go to college to get a piece of paper. They couldn't care less whether they get it by cheating or by honest work. The piece of paper is all that matters.

That means they are admitting too much.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like you are in a pre-med class? My SO once TA'd for a pre-med class. Holy hell, the students were something else as compared to other disciplines. They literally would not leave my SO's office until they had argued up their grades on every assignment. My SO had to get security to escort them out, I am not joking. If they forgot, say, to multiply by 2 and then got the answer wrong, they still argued for ful…

I experienced the same thing while TAing physics for biosciences for a few semesters (which was 90% pre-meds), though I never had to call security. One apparently needs close to a 4.0 GPA, plus many extracurricular volunteer hours to qualify for medical school, plus glowing letters of recommendation. I also overheard a number of stories about pre-med students intentionally sabotaging other students by misleading them…

> I also overheard a number of stories about pre-med students intentionally sabotaging other students by misleading them to think that private group tutoring sessions (to study for the MCAT) had been canceled.

These aren't rumors.

Pre-meds hate other pre-meds and are conditioned to play a zero sum game against one another.

We then expect them to completely flip their attitude and become teams players. Collaborate with other medical professionals (former pre-meds), nurses and social workers.

No wonder healthcare is so dysfunctional.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#296
post #185

I took an online class in 2015 that used Proctorio. Even at that time the proctoring/anti-cheat software was a nightmare. I was semi-accused of cheating because of "anomalies" during one of my tests. It was quickly cleared up by talking to the professor. The software is a privacy disaster and any computer that has had any of this spyware installed should be considered compromised. I kept a separate hard drive and wou…

The main problem is that receiving a credential and receiving an education are very different things that we do at the same time out of tradition and convenience. When testing was easy, it made sense to lump it in with teaching, but now that testing is impossible, I say we ditch it for the time being.

The problem with that is that you're throwing out the one that is more directly valuable to your customers.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#297
post #267

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> Google really is making the smartest move out of all the FAANG corps in that regard, by placing grater value on their own rather than degrees. Sorry could you explain that? Do Google now run courses and place value on having completed them in interviews?

> Sorry could you explain that? Do Google now run courses and place value on having completed them in interviews? Yes. They are slowly offering those options along with other tech companies. I think Shopify has the best model: https://devdegree.ca/

Is it a real degree or some type of bootcamp?

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#298

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How do you propose that this should work e.g. in proof-based maths courses? You can't just tweak a theorem to prove by the value of some "unique seed", the theorem might become wrong. It's true that you usually can't cheat your way through such an exam provided you actually write the answer yourself, but in a take-home situation you can always ask someone else to solve it for you.

You do what my teachers do and have unique problem generation software.

what? how does that work?

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#299
post #276

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How does one fib proficiency in a role as an individual contributor? I mean after school is through? I have been a software engineer for 14years. I am self taught with only a 2yr degree i completed my 4th year into this career. Can a line in resume(a degree mention) remedy a failed technical screening process? Personal experience : I have declined several MD CS holders this year alone for positions because their demo…

With remote, anything is possible. Someone basically outsourced his job to China, paid someone a cheaper rate to do his work for him.

Yeah, incredible story... Could have lasted, but too bad he was a bit careless in handing out his company's personal credentials to the Chinese team as well.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do what my teachers do and have unique problem generation software.

what? how does that work?

You give it a few hundred problem classes, and constraints for possible answers, and it will randomize the class of problems and generate a unique problem as well as calculate the answer. Then you submit the answer as well as your work and it gets corrected.

For things such as proofs, it might give you a problem for which the theorem is needed, then ask you to solve the problem, indicate which theorem you used, and then prove the theorem.

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