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Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

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Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#581

Post by busyant »

Balgair wrote: post #442
busyant wrote: post #346

I was a grad student @ Princeton a handful of decades ago. I was a TA for a few classes and, given the honor code, we did not proctor the exams for undergrads. We just handed them out (left the room) and returned to collect them at the end. - One of the exams in a course that I TAed had 5 free-response questions. - There were also 5 TAs in that class, so we un-stapled the exams and each TA graded one question (for co…

I mean I get that the student broke the rules, at least per this anecdote. And what was done is dishonorable and the student deserves what is coming to the student. But, I think it gets to a deeper issue with education. Like, the cynic in me will say that the student learned a new tactic, one that got rewarded, and they are likely to repeat it over and over. But the teacher, the hopeful part of me, the one that wants…

> Because they are still trying to pull one over, to be cleverer, to be the 'good' one at whatever life is in their mind: A long fucking ladder covered in degrees and accolades and tears and jackasses. They live in the derivative.

OP here. I think you're attributing relatively sophisticated motivations to cheating. I've seen it at elite institutions and those that were far less prestigious.

I don't think the motivations for cheating are different in the Ivy League compared to any other institution.

If I can speculate on most motivations (no particular order), they would be:

- Failing would be an embarrassment (to me, my family, etc.) and I probably won't get caught.

- The work for this course is completely irrelevant to my career path. They're just making me jump through hoops. I'll work honestly after I cheat my way through this course.

- I'm pressed for time or other there are other external issues fucking up my life, so I don't have time to study. I could definitely understand the course material if weren't happening right now, so cheating isn't that big of a deal.

I think most of this is excuse-making, but the human mind is capable of magnificent self-deceptions.

A couple more points (not really addressed to you).

I agree with many other commenters who say that the school admins do not want you to drop problems like this at their doorstep. The prof. usually has to navigate these waters on his/her own.

I've told this story many times over the years and the most common response (also given here) is something like "I'm sure she's put her talents to great use on Wall Street". Gives you a sense of public perception of Wall Street--which I believe is largely accurate.

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#582

Post by Forgeties79 »

levocardia wrote: post #416
marsten wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Academic integrity committees at prestigious schools are horribly lax. They want these types of issues to go away quietly. I have a friend who in college had another student take his test from the "complete" pile, erase my friend's name, and put on his own instead. It was only through blind luck that my friend figured it out. He, the TA, and the professor reported it – with smoking gun proof – but nothing happened. T…

Not even prestigious ones. The school needs to sound like it has strong penalties against cheating, so there are really strict-sounding policies ("zero in the course"). But also, so many students cheat that actually enforcing these policies uniformly would hurt your graduation stats, make unhappy customers (students + parents), and hurt your revenue if you actually expel them. So the equilibrium is that the burden of…

> So the equilibrium is that the burden of reporting cheating is foisted upon professors, and it is understood -- though never explicitly communicated -- that academic integrity proceedings will be a huge administrative pain for you, the professor, and it is in your interest not to initiate them.

Not only that, but if you accuse a student of cheating and they are expelled, you have fundamentally altered their life forever. Talk about a burden.

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#583

Post by Forgeties79 »

riknos314 wrote: post #470
silver_silver wrote: post #451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reality is that it’s not possible to learn if one offloads the work itself to an LLM

A more accurate phrasing is: It's significantly less likely that one learns the portion of the work they offload to an LLM. A random anecdote is that most of the people I know who went very far in theoretical math are relatively poor at basic mental arithmetic, because they always think in the abstract and offload addition and multiplication to the calculator. It doesn't mean they can't do it, they just aren't as pra…

The difference is that at one point they could do basic arithmetic. They went through the fundamentals/building blocks to get where they are currently. Getting weaker at something is not the same as never having to put in the effort to learn it in the first place. Just because they’re not particularly good at it anymore doesn’t mean they don’t understand how arithmetic fundamentally works (which would be incredibly concerning). They can look at a problem on a piece of paper and completely understand what it means.

Also, they are leaning on a calculator, a specific tool with a proven use that literally everyone knows how to use. LLM’s are glorified beta tests where the VC-backed companies are begging the rest of us to figure out the billion dollar application for them. It doesn’t even remotely compare from a utility standpoint. I don’t need to promise you what a calculator will eventually do when it gets better or convince you of their usefulness. It is self evident and consistent

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#584

Post by wat10000 »

crazygringo wrote: post #578
wat10000 wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't say you said cheating is fine. But you are defending it by minimizing its consequences. No, I don't see any moral value in following the law. Following the law can be and often is morally good by coincidence because the law encodes some piece of morality, e.g. the laws against theft or murder. But if the law says I'm only allowed to cross the street at designated locations, and I can safely cross at a differ…

> No, I don't see any moral value in following the law. Just so you know, that's not a position most moral philosophers take, as long as the law is decided by sufficiently democratic procedures. The fact that you belong to a group of people, and the people decide on rules, means that violating those rules is a moral violation against that community of people. To say that has no moral weight at all is a pretty extreme…

Who determines what's "sufficiently democratic"? Do most moral philosophers really believe that being one vote out of many thousands to choose one representative to send to a legislative body of dozens is sufficiently democratic to obligate me to follow a pointless law that was written long before I was even born?

Not that it's going to change my view, but I'm curious if that's really the position they take.

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#585

Post by ahtihn »

Forgeties79 wrote: post #582
levocardia wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not even prestigious ones. The school needs to sound like it has strong penalties against cheating, so there are really strict-sounding policies ("zero in the course"). But also, so many students cheat that actually enforcing these policies uniformly would hurt your graduation stats, make unhappy customers (students + parents), and hurt your revenue if you actually expel them. So the equilibrium is that the burden of…

> So the equilibrium is that the burden of reporting cheating is foisted upon professors, and it is understood -- though never explicitly communicated -- that academic integrity proceedings will be a huge administrative pain for you, the professor, and it is in your interest not to initiate them. Not only that, but if you accuse a student of cheating and they are expelled, you have fundamentally altered their life fo…

That's like saying if you accuse someone of murder and they get convicted, you've altered their life forever.

That's not a burden, it's justice.

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#586

Post by hgoel »

tdeck wrote: post #567
hgoel wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This fits with my priors. I was in grad school during covid and had some professors I was close to (and whose class I was taking) reach out asking for feedback on their exam because students were blatantly cheating despite the allowances the professors were making (up to being open to the internet, just no direct communication). They couldn't punish them, and they were perplexed why anyone would bother cheating on ev…

> students were refusing to think for themselves even when given open ended projects. They were just having ChatGPT come up with the project idea for them instead of taking advantage of the freedom to do something they enjoyed. Those kinds of projects are a big trap for certain kinds of people. If I had used ChatGPT in college, maybe I wouldn't have come up with overly-ambitious projects that seemed doable at the tim…

I agree that they can be a trap, but I think that is remedied by requiring a small project proposal step.

Ensures that students have a plan, that the goals are achievable, and can help to spread out the project's points.

Also helps when profs make it clear that they're more concerned about seeing what you know/learned and how you approached the problem, not whether or not you achieved exactly what you promised.

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#587

Post by FireBeyond »

Forgeties79 wrote: post #550
rayiner wrote: post #540

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does a student know how much cheating goes unreported in each group to form an opinion as to whether the policy is being applied fairly?

I’m an alum now, not a student, but even college students can submit a FOIA request. Additionally, the school can look in to it if it wants. The possibilities are near-endless for getting this kind of info. There’s also the simple fact that it’s not like it’s a secret when someone is expelled. I don’t understand why you think it’s so impossible for people to prove this problem exists. For starters, they could simply…

> I’m an alum now, not a student, but even college students can submit a FOIA request.

"Show me the reports on unreported cheating"?

> Additionally, you could see the breakdown by race (and more) of people that were expelled.

How do you know they were expelled for cheating? And not sexual harassment, or in some universities breaking codes of conduct around public behavior.

You have heard of FERPA, right? It would be entirely illegal to give information that allows identification of students based on academic results.

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#588

Post by FireBeyond »

rayiner wrote: post #554
Forgeties79 wrote: post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m an alum now, not a student, but even college students can submit a FOIA request. Additionally, the school can look in to it if it wants. The possibilities are near-endless for getting this kind of info. There’s also the simple fact that it’s not like it’s a secret when someone is expelled. I don’t understand why you think it’s so impossible for people to prove this problem exists. For starters, they could simply…

I didn’t say it was “impossible.” I just asked you for your evidence. Do you have evidence similarly situated individuals were treated differently? Do you have evidence of events of cheating going unreported? I’m not saying you’re wrong about your ultimate conclusion. I’m asking about the type of evidence you believe is sufficient to support that conclusion. The fact that most teachers were uncomfortable reporting mi…

Replying to your dead comment:

Why is multiple county and school district-wide segregation policies "personal racism" but as soon as it goes to a university it becomes "institutional"?

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#589

Post by Forgeties79 »

ahtihn wrote: post #585
Forgeties79 wrote: post #582

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So the equilibrium is that the burden of reporting cheating is foisted upon professors, and it is understood -- though never explicitly communicated -- that academic integrity proceedings will be a huge administrative pain for you, the professor, and it is in your interest not to initiate them. Not only that, but if you accuse a student of cheating and they are expelled, you have fundamentally altered their life fo…

That's like saying if you accuse someone of murder and they get convicted, you've altered their life forever. That's not a burden, it's justice.

It is not reasonable to expect a calculus professor to routinely decide if they want to derail someone’s entire future because, for whatever reason (a whole other discussion), they tried to cheat on an assignment. A lot of systems don’t have multiple strikes or are otherwise deeply flawed (as well as routinely shown to be ineffective). If you cheat and are caught, you are expelled. There is no sense of proportion or nuance to those kinds of systems and to ask faculty and students to voluntarily enforce that for your school is a ridiculous expectation.

If you’re asking me if there are situations where a student should be expelled because of cheating, the answer is yes. But I would say there are a lot of factors that have to be considered. It certainly can’t be one size fits all, which a number of institutions do. Otherwise it is not “justice” in the slightest. It’s taking a “tough on crime” approach to young adults in school enforced by their educators and peers, which is…well, let’s say “not effective.” At the end of the day these are institutions for learning. Plenty of people make huge mistakes, including massive breaches of trust, then learn their lesson and become better people for it. Giving a 0 on an assignment is often sufficient if we’re being honest. In a lot of cases that dig such a deep hole that your grade will never recover. If you want punitive measures, and one that hits where it hurts in a way that is relevant to the act of cheating, it doesn’t get much more appropriate than that. Not to mention the educator is going to watch them like a hawk for the rest of the semester.

I’m not even going to bother elaborating on how absurd it is to compare murder and cheating on a homework assignment or whatever.

Re: Princeton mandates proctoring for in-person exams, upending 133 year precedent

#590

Post by gregw2 »

amirhirsch wrote: post #197
neilv wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm very interested in how this cheating is perceived by other students. There is no peer pressure not to cheat? Students aren't considered sketchy or jerky for cheating? Being seen cheating has no adverse affect on their ability to date, to join group projects, to join student startups, etc.?

At least in my experience (MIT ’06) many of the people most comfortable gaming academics ended up in finance. I've always felt that it was these kind of folks that caused the 2008 financial crisis

That's a very interesting call out, the connection between gaming academics and (gaming) finance.

They both do have very concrete point systems with a parallel set of less-measured but very real externalities, don't they?

This brings me to a bit of a related story.

A family member of mine who attended Princeton and was an undergraduate Residential Advisor (RA) in the dorms responsible for care of freshmen recalled hearing a presentation in the early 2000s to parents of students from an academic dean or faculty member. The dean boasted to the parents how great their kids were, describing how each year in the last decade they kept adding more work to the students and the students kept rising to the challenge. My family member RA, very aware of the resulting stress the students were under was horrified. This family member thrived at Princeton and loved it, but is quite wary of trying to put their own children on a track to get there or go there.

This event correlates with the increasing fraction of students at Princeton going into finance which began in the early 1990s and which peaked in 2006 with 46% of students at Princeton going into Finance. I had not considered a correlation between student psychological stress and psychology of "gaming"/cheating and the psychological going into finance until your comment.

At that time, there was some sense that perhaps many Princetonians went into Finance because they had to pay of the huge loans from the price tag. After a couple decades on working on financial aid improvements, now that Princeton (tuition) is free for people with family incomes under $250k/year and has been for a while, and still large numbers (admittedly not quite as large) are still going into finance, I'm not sure some of the psychological factors around taboo topics like gaming/cheating and/or more prosaic related factors like reducing cheating while properly sizing the expected workload for the non-cheating population have been explored.

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