Jacksonville State University Bars Cheating Students from Graduation

Plus, high school students in New Zealand are accused of using AI to cheat. Surprise, they say they didn't do it. Plus, cheers for Forbes coverage of Chegg crash.

May 04, 2023

Issue 207

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Cheating by “Large Group” at Jacksonville State University

Local news has the story of cheating and related student complaints at Jacksonville State University (Alabama).

According to the report and public statements, a “large group” of students was caught cheating on a physics exam and, as a result, some of them were barred from graduation, otherwise suspended or expelled. Students contacted the local paper to share their views that the investigation process was unfair and the punishments too much.

They do not deny cheating. In fact, their online public petition says:

They apologize for cheating but believe the punishment was too severe.

The petition also says:

Students who were set to graduate were not allowed to graduate, even though they had completed their coursework.

To which I must ask - did they though? Complete their coursework?

I mean, doesn’t cheating invalidate the argument that you did what was required in order to earn a degree? Moreover, since we know the rate at which cheating is caught is terrifyingly low, and that even when it is caught the consequences are rare, it seems unlikely that these students cheated just this one time.

A few other things here.

One is that, according to what’s in the reporting, the students were not caught by the school but by a student who saved images of a student group chat and reported it.

Which lets me make these two points again. Schools are not doing nearly enough to stop cheating. In this case, the cheating would have certainly gone undetected and students would have actually graduated, having cheated. And it seems that schools rarely consider the impact that cheating has on those who don’t cheat. Not only does cheating penalize honesty in competitive academic dynamics, it demoralizes the rule-followers and honest scholars - occasionally, to the point where they feel compelled to act. Presumably, because they sense that no one else will.

Another note is that this incident is the rare example in which publicity was in a local, general audience news outlet. Though the reporting definately centers on the complaints of the students instead of the import of the cheating.

I also found it interesting that it seems that some of the students in this situation were banking on a lenient, first-time punishment if they were caught.

One student who contacted the paper wrote:

half of us having first offenses with this situation, but no warning or first offense punishment, was given.

He, at least, clearly wanted or expected a warning. Or a slap on the hand.

Plus, half? So, half this group was caught cheating before?

The group petition also tellingly says:

The group believe that the punishment should be consistent with the code of conduct, which calls for failing the course and receiving zeroes for the first offense.

The school should follow its policies; and I have no idea whether it did or not.

But the point is that the students wanted or expected less severe consequences. It’s impossible to think that when the decision was made to cheat, the expectation of rather passive, “first offense” punishments was not a factor. After all, based on what we know, half the group had been caught already. And there they were, in class, taking a test.

The students’ complaint again is not that they will receive sanctions, but that the sanctions are too harsh, based on what they anticipated.

Finally, good for JSU. Integrity and conviction can be lonely and costly. And while I do have empathy for the students who may have their lives and careers altered by their choices, I am confident that this action will prevent oodles of future misconduct. As research clearly shows, the likelihood and severity of potential consequences significantly reduces misconduct.

New Zealand High Schoolers Accused of Cheating with ChatGPT

The New Zealand Herald has a story of two high school students who had been accused of using AI/ChatGPT to cheat on assignments.

Unfortunately, it’s news because the students - and their parents - say the accusations are erroneous and are questioning the AI detection tools the schools used. So far, the schools are standing by their process and decisions.

I’m highlighting this story because it’s a good reminder that academic misconduct is not bound by academic level, especially AI-created cheating.

The story is also a good example of a misguided public framing we’re already seeing quite often - teachers and schools officials and an AI-detector say writing was generated by AI, plus a student swearing it was not, somehow equals that the accusation is wrong and the technology is flawed. It’s genuinely odd.

Another reason that this story is important is because it seems as though, in these cases, the teachers and schools did everything right. I mean, perfectly. From the article:

The students failed written assessments after teachers at Cambridge High School and Pukekohe High School flagged an issue with their work and used AI tech for a second opinion.

I’m sorry - that’s exactly right.

Teachers, who knew these students, knew their work, thought something was odd about an assignment. Then they ran it through an AI detection, which confirmed the original suspicion. You could do it the other way - AI check first, followed by a teacher review - but this way is actually better.

Further, read this, from the school principals:

Pukekohe High School principal Richard Barnett said teachers will speak to students about their level of understanding to see if it correlates with the written understanding of a finished assignment.
Barnett said his staff, who “know their students individually”, make judgments on which work needs additional scrutiny.
Cambridge High School principal Greg Thornton also said: “We review each student’s work using teacher judgment. Only the scripts that are not considered to potentially be a student’s own work are further investigated.”
Thornton said teacher judgment involved looking at the students’ previous work and their “overall performance” in class.

Exactly. We’re either going to trust teachers or we’re not. And if a teacher flags your work then gets a level of independent confirmation, what’s wrong with that? Moreover, initiating a conversation to verify the “level of understanding to see if it correlates with the written understanding of the finished assignment” is exactly and precisely what we should want to happen.

But the students say they didn’t cheat. So, it’s news. Call me biased - I am inclined to believe the teacher, the AI-detector and the school principal instead of the student who denies misconduct.

The mother of one of the students told the paper:

“People take [the software] as gospel and it’s not. It’s full of falsehood and made-up information.
“My issue with it all is that if this is how schools are checking work it’s just ridiculous when we know that ChatGPT - everything I’ve read about it says that it’s unreliable, it’s inconsistent.”
The mother described the use of AI technology to help grade school work as like “Russian roulette”.

If you were basing a misconduct accusation on AI alone, which no one should do, sure. But this was not AI alone that flagged this work. The process started with an informed and aware educator, as it should.

In my book, these schools were dead-on right as it relates to process - using technology to back and verify, not judge or accuse. Initiating a follow up inquiry on content comprehension - perfect. If, after all that, an allegation of misconduct is made, the problem may not lie with the software.

Seriously, the teachers and administrators at Cambridge High School and Pukekohe High School deserve ribbons.

The NZ article also has two other sections worth sharing, including:

Principal investigator of the Research on Academic Integrity in New Zealand (Rainz) Project and University of Auckland Associate Professor Jason Stephens has researched cheating for two decades.
He said with AI tools now readily available, “the opportunity for cheating and all manner of misconduct is seemingly endless”.
He discussed that to combat the risk of inauthenticity within schooling, students must document their work and work process.

Indeed, with AI, the opportunity for cheating and all manner of misconduct is seemingly endless.

Continuing:

In a recent survey conducted by the Rainz project headed by Stephens of more than 5000 tertiary students at seven universities in NZ, 13.9 per cent of students indicated they had used an artificial intelligence tool to complete academic work.
“Given that we conducted this survey last year, before the release of ChatGPT, we can expect this number to increase in the year ahead,” Stephens said.

Sorry, 14% used AI to do academic work before ChatGPT?

Good gravy.

Forbes Covers Chegg Crash

One of the biggest stories of the week in finance news has been the collapse of cheating company Chegg (see Issue 206). Among those covering the carnage was Forbes where the writer of the story, Molly Bohannon, did a great job.

This is the headline:

Chegg—Education Company Criticized For Helping Students Cheat—Says More Turning To ChatGPT As Stock Plunges

Getting cheating in the headline, even if it’s with the indirect “criticized for” attribution, is a win.

The open paragraph is:

Chegg, a multi-billion dollar company that makes its money by teaming up with college students to study (and cheat) their way through courses, reported a 46% decline in its shares Tuesday morning

I left that link in so you can see it goes to Forbes’s top-shelf coverage of Chegg as cheater. The story from early 2021 was a literal cover story in the actual print edition of Forbes. They were on Chegg early, and that sense of ownership is underpinning their coverage.

The new coverage is just as good. It goes on. Under “Key Facts,” Forbes lists:

Chegg offers students the ability to pass courses without doing the work by providing access to its database of at least 46 million textbook and exam problems and to round-the-clock freelancers in India who answer student-submitted questions in real time, all for a subscription fee of about $20 a month.

The ability to pass courses without doing the work is precisely what Chegg does. Very few people report that, but it’s true.