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

dailyprincetonian.com

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

#61

Post by galleywest200 »

bdangubic wrote: post #32
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What on earth could be the objection to proctoring? There is a unique pride in being part of a community built around honor. You see this on the Swiss metro and in small-town vegetable stalls. Unproctored exams force every student to weigh the value of their honor against a better grade. That's a personal moral reckoning that might be worth the entire degree.

> There is a unique pride in being part of a community built around honor. It has been 100(s) of years since community like this existed, now this is utopia

I definitely still see honor system pay boxes in the USA. Maybe not in big cities, but outside of them.

Disc golf courses, fire wood piles, that day’s chicken eggs in a wooden box on the side of the road.

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

#62

Post by Waterluvian »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #21
kibwen wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fish rots from the head. It's a sucker's game to aspire to selflessly serve the greater good when the most powerful people in the land are brazenly corrupt pedophiles. In other words: monkey see, monkey do.

> fish rots from the head Does it? Did it? We elected the "brazenly corrupt pedophiles." This question seems complex and important enough to not be resolved with a truism.

It really doesn’t. Trump wouldn’t survive election if the electorate didn’t seek, or at least tolerate whatever the hell you can call that. Americans will conveniently point fingers at him (as is their political tradition) but he’s a consequence of a much deeper disease.

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

#63

Post by remarkEon »

applfanboysbgon wrote: post #47
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #10

Combined with the increasing acceptance of shoplifting [1] and unprecedented corruption and criminality among our national leaders, it's hard not to read this as a moral page turning on American culture. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/04/hasan-piker-jia-to...

> in some left-wing corners of the commentariat, is out; flagrant disregard of the social contract is in. Interesting that this is posed as the American left disregarding the social contract. I think you could make a pretty good case that the American right disregarded the social contract first in electing an extremely destructive pedophile who starts wars for reasons that can't even be articulated, pardons war crimi…

I can assure you with 100% certainty that the American Right did not elect Bill Clinton.

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

#64

Post by lll-o-lll »

kibwen wrote: post #20
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #10

Combined with the increasing acceptance of shoplifting [1] and unprecedented corruption and criminality among our national leaders, it's hard not to read this as a moral page turning on American culture. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/04/hasan-piker-jia-to...

The fish rots from the head. It's a sucker's game to aspire to selflessly serve the greater good when the most powerful people in the land are brazenly corrupt pedophiles. In other words: monkey see, monkey do.

> The fish rots from the head.

The old adage that the people elect the governance they deserve; comes to mind. The concepts of Virtue, Honour, Duty, and Justice have been declining in the West over a very long period (this is not a US specific thing). The rotting head reflects the rotting society.

> It's a sucker's game to aspire to selflessly serve the greater good when the most powerful people in the land are brazenly corrupt

You don’t act honourably because that will “get you ahead”. You act honourably because it is right.

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

#65

Post by traderj0e »

fegu wrote: post #51

Could it be non-proctoring has served Princeton by inflating grades due to some cheating, but only now have cheating become rampant enough that it must be curtailed to destroy the reputation entirely?

I honestly think it's that. I've seen it before at other private schools, where someone is caught cheating and let off with very minor consequences. Private high schools were hiding it from colleges too.

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

#66

Post by gizajob »

wps wrote: post #27

I've sat in classes where people at my table genuinely took pictures of the exam while the professor's back was turned (being kind to us and giving us useful information on the board) and uploaded the entire exam to the Gemini app. Cheating is all around disheartening and is now incredibly easy with all the free multi-modal models around. Real active proctoring is needed and devices need to be confiscated during exam…

That’s pretty sad. Even sadder is that those people will hardly even feel it to be cheating because they’re now using AI for absolutely everything and so suddenly contented with a situation where it can’t be used they still can’t help but use it. Not a good sign.

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

#67

Post by nightpool »

john_strinlai wrote: post #5

huh, i had no idea princeton specifically disallowed proctors, and instead relied on an honor system. seems... like a poorly thought out system, especially given: " 29.9 percent of respondents reported that they had cheated on an assignment or exam during their time at Princeton. 44.6 percent of senior respondents reported knowledge of Honor Code violations that they chose not to report. " crazier is the people prote…

The history of the Honor Code system might be instructive: https://universityarchives.princeton.edu/2015/01/i-pledge-my...

Exames were previously proctored, and it led to a "us vs them" mentality that meant students banded together to

The Honor Code system, and removing proctors was a way to route around that—it made all of the students responsible for catching cheaters and turned the "Students vs Faculty" mentality into a "Honor vs Cheaters" mentality among the students.

Unfortunately, it seems like the "Students vs Faculty" mentality has seen too much of a resurgence due to outside factors, and the Honor Code is no longer a match for the current climate. That's what the article is about

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

#68

Post by RIMR »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #10

Combined with the increasing acceptance of shoplifting [1] and unprecedented corruption and criminality among our national leaders, it's hard not to read this as a moral page turning on American culture. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/04/hasan-piker-jia-to...

Moral acceptance of petty theft always increases with inequality. When the poor take from the rich, people don't care as much. The poorer the thief and the richer the victim, the less people care. Go far enough, and people view the thief as a Robin Hood-style hero.

Given that we're at a point in American history where inequality is quite extreme, I don't think it's fair to compare shoplifting to the corruption of the ruling class that is largely responsible for the current levels of inequality in the first place.

To be quite frank, under current conditions, it is a moral failure to see fault with impoverished people for stealing what they need to survive, not the other way around.

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

#70

Post by remarkEon »

john_strinlai wrote: post #5

huh, i had no idea princeton specifically disallowed proctors, and instead relied on an honor system. seems... like a poorly thought out system, especially given: " 29.9 percent of respondents reported that they had cheated on an assignment or exam during their time at Princeton. 44.6 percent of senior respondents reported knowledge of Honor Code violations that they chose not to report. " crazier is the people prote…

To people who have not grown up in extremely honor-bound societies and communities the idea sounds strange, yes. To those of us who did, however, events like this remind us of how fragile those systems are and that entry should be severely restricted.
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