Students "Easily Cheating" Remote Proctoring
Plus, cheating at University of Minnesota. Plus, students at George Washington University want decreased penalties for certain kinds of cheating.
Issue 12, March 15, 2021
VICE Absolutely Blows its Coverage of Cheating Exam Proctoring
VICE, the edgy TV show turned website, published a piece March 5, titled “Students Are Easily Cheating 'State-of-the-Art' Test Proctoring Tech.”
The piece recounts students evading the proctoring system of Proctorio. Students, the story says, use hidden phones and run computer cables to other machines used by collaborating cheaters. Supposedly, 10 students in different countries said they evaded Proctorio without consequence. As such, the writer wants to make the case that Proctorio, and presumably similar security solutions, aren’t worth it.
The relative ease with which the students cheated, and the fact that each student could point to multiple peers who had done the same (one American student estimated that 90 percent of her class had cheated), raises the question of how effective online proctoring software like Proctorio actually is—and whether it is worth the hefty price tag or the invasion of privacy.
In addition to using the ridiculous term “invasion of privacy,” the VICE article uses “invasive proctoring” and says proctoring “surveils students.” Objective reporting, it is not.
First and foremost, yes students are cheating. Many of them, intentionally, creatively and frequently. VICE is absolutely right about that.
Unfortunately, by proving that students are cheating, VICE isn’t making the case against proctoring, they’re showing why more and better academic security is urgently needed. If 90% of a class is cheating with your proctoring software, it’s time to get a better system, not time to give in and sanction cheating.
The article says that Proctorio,
helps at least give the impression that academic integrity is being maintained during remote learning.
Anyone who understands cheating knows this perception is integral to stopping cheating. Simply having a system to stop cheating stops cheating. Even passive detection systems change the risk/reward calculation and demonstrate risk awareness - like a security camera at a convenience store. People do still rob convenience stores. No one says security cameras are a useless waste of money.
Proctorio is the security camera version of remote proctoring. It records a test session and uses software to review it, flagging suspicious sessions for school review. It’s not a great system. In fact, most test sessions recorded using Proctorio-type proctoring are never reviewed by anyone, even the test sessions “flagged” for suspicious activity. So, VICE saying an automated, recorded proctoring solution is “state of the art,” using it as a proxy for all proctoring, is either ignorant or deceptive by design.
Nonetheless, there simply is no credibility in the type of argument VICE is trying to make - that checking for speeding and issuing tickets is pointless because people still break speed limits. How much speeding would happen, do you think, if we stopped issuing speeding tickets?
The piece ends by quoting a cheating student,
[the school] can’t admit to having bought a useless piece of crap
Maybe the school did buy a solution that’s cheap and not so great. They should probably spend more and get a better one. But any system that deters cheating is better than no system at all.
The University of Minnesota Has a Cheating Problem - And Good on Them
Local reporting from the University of Minnesota (March 11) found, “more students are turning to scholastic dishonesty.” According to the story, the school
has seen an increase in reported instances of scholastic dishonesty over recent years, prompting concern among faculty and administrators that this academic year could see even more as a result of online-only learning.
And
One major way students are cheating is through the use of tutoring websites, like Chegg and Course Hero, to find answers to tests and quizzes
No kidding. It continues,
Not all cheaters are necessarily being caught, however, said associate director of the OCS, Katie Koopmeiners.
“We know the real number is so much higher,” Koopmeiners said. “A lot of times either faculty don’t report even though they’re supposed to, or they’re not catching it or they feel like they don’t have enough evidence, so they’re not reporting it. … We know that incidents of scholastic dishonesty are being underreported on campus.”
The numbers, according to the reporting, are 390 reported cases of “scholastic dishonesty” in 2017-18, 443 cases in 2018-19, another 566 cases in 2019-20 and 379 cases so far this year, up to February 10, 2021.
Kudos to university leaders for talking about the cheating challenge publicly and taking a firm line on what it really means. Kenneth Leopold, Chair of the Student Academic Integrity Committee (SAIC), said
A university degree ought to be backed by substance. Cheating undermines learning and therefore dilutes the substance
George Washington Students Want Lower Penalties for Cheating on Homework
At George Washington University, the Student Association Senate unanimously approved a measure that reportedly would allow
certain [cheating] violations to not remain on a student’s transcript after graduation and requesting “a restorative and educational approach” be taken for “low-level” violations.
According to the news source, a school official said
violations on smaller assignments would be treated less harshly than for larger assignments under the updated guidelines.
“We have added language to say that the significance of the assignment in question can be a factor in sanctioning so presumably cheating on a homework set is less serious than cheating on a final exam,” [the school official] said.
It’s probably obvious why that’s a horrible idea.
The school was set to review, and possibly approve, the student proposal but did not respond to inquiry about whether it had.
In the next “The Cheat Sheet,” professors at Rensselaer Tech in NY, have what they say is a way to stop students from collaborating during digital tests. Plus, cheating at Thompson Rivers University and others. Don’t miss it. Sign up below.