Cheating-Detection Software Provokes 'School-Surveillance Revolt' (msn.com) 143
New webcam-based anti-cheating monitoring is so stressful, it's made some students cry, the Washington Post reports:
"Online proctoring" companies saw in coronavirus shutdowns a chance to capitalize on a major reshaping of education, selling schools a high-tech blend of webcam-watching workers and eye-tracking software designed to catch students cheating on their exams. They've taken in millions of dollars, some of it public money, from thousands of colleges in recent months. But they've also sparked a nationwide school-surveillance revolt, with students staging protests and adopting creative tactics to push campus administrators to reconsider the deals. Students argue that the testing systems have made them afraid to click too much or rest their eyes for fear they'll be branded as cheats...
One system, Proctorio, uses gaze-detection, face-detection and computer-monitoring software to flag students for any "abnormal" head movement, mouse movement, eye wandering, computer window resizing, tab opening, scrolling, clicking, typing, and copies and pastes. A student can be flagged for finishing the test too quickly, or too slowly, clicking too much, or not enough. If the camera sees someone else in the background, a student can be flagged for having "multiple faces detected." If someone else takes the test on the same network — say, in a dorm building — it's potential "exam collusion." Room too noisy, Internet too spotty, camera on the fritz? Flag, flag, flag.
As an unusually disrupted fall semester churns toward finals, this student rebellion has erupted into online war, with lawsuits, takedowns and viral brawls further shaking the anxiety-inducing backdrop of college exams. Some students have even tried to take the software down from the inside, digging through the code for details on how it monitors millions of high-stakes exams... Some students said the experience of having strangers and algorithms silently judge their movements was deeply unnerving, and many worried that even being accused of cheating could endanger their chances at good grades, scholarships, internships and post-graduation careers. Several students said they had hoped for freeing, friend-filled college years but were now resigned to hours of monitored video exams in their childhood bedrooms, with no clear end in sight....
[T]he systems' technical demands have made just taking the tests almost comically complicated. One student at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario shared the instructions for his online Introduction to Linear Algebra midterm: five pages, totaling more than 2,000 words, requiring students to use a special activity-monitoring Web browser and keep their face, hands and desk in view of their camera at all times...
Students who break the rules or face technical difficulties can be investigated for academic misconduct. "The instructions," the student said, "are giving me more anxiety than the test itself."
Company executives "say a semester without proctors would turn online testing into a lawless wasteland" according to the article. But one long-time teacher counters that "the most clear value conveyed to students is 'We don't trust you.'"
Yet the education tech nonprofit Educause reported that 54% of higher education institutions they'd surveyed "are currently using online or remote proctoring services.
"And another 23% are planning or considering using them."
One system, Proctorio, uses gaze-detection, face-detection and computer-monitoring software to flag students for any "abnormal" head movement, mouse movement, eye wandering, computer window resizing, tab opening, scrolling, clicking, typing, and copies and pastes. A student can be flagged for finishing the test too quickly, or too slowly, clicking too much, or not enough. If the camera sees someone else in the background, a student can be flagged for having "multiple faces detected." If someone else takes the test on the same network — say, in a dorm building — it's potential "exam collusion." Room too noisy, Internet too spotty, camera on the fritz? Flag, flag, flag.
As an unusually disrupted fall semester churns toward finals, this student rebellion has erupted into online war, with lawsuits, takedowns and viral brawls further shaking the anxiety-inducing backdrop of college exams. Some students have even tried to take the software down from the inside, digging through the code for details on how it monitors millions of high-stakes exams... Some students said the experience of having strangers and algorithms silently judge their movements was deeply unnerving, and many worried that even being accused of cheating could endanger their chances at good grades, scholarships, internships and post-graduation careers. Several students said they had hoped for freeing, friend-filled college years but were now resigned to hours of monitored video exams in their childhood bedrooms, with no clear end in sight....
[T]he systems' technical demands have made just taking the tests almost comically complicated. One student at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario shared the instructions for his online Introduction to Linear Algebra midterm: five pages, totaling more than 2,000 words, requiring students to use a special activity-monitoring Web browser and keep their face, hands and desk in view of their camera at all times...
Students who break the rules or face technical difficulties can be investigated for academic misconduct. "The instructions," the student said, "are giving me more anxiety than the test itself."
Company executives "say a semester without proctors would turn online testing into a lawless wasteland" according to the article. But one long-time teacher counters that "the most clear value conveyed to students is 'We don't trust you.'"
Yet the education tech nonprofit Educause reported that 54% of higher education institutions they'd surveyed "are currently using online or remote proctoring services.
"And another 23% are planning or considering using them."
No problems here. Prof can watch my video (Score:5, Insightful)
I've been using various proctoring software for exams for several years and haven't had any problems and haven't heard students express any problems at my schools.
Perhaps some students are concerned because somebody has given them the wrong idea about what "flag" means. Flags are just things that the instructors are made aware of, so they can decide if they want to check that portion of the video. Something like:
Another person was in the room at 13:46
The instructor or a TA can then watch that part of the video and see the six-year-old walk in a say "daddy I'm hungry".
"Flag" does NOT mean "you fail the exam" or "accused of cheating". It means something was detected and maybe the TA or instructor might want to see what it was. That's all.
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It seems that the flagging is handled differently depending on the respective professor or software platform used.
Some students will be more disadvantaged than others, as is usually the case with highly standardized education solutions.
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> Some students will be more disadvantaged than others, as is usually the case
Well yes, if my kid wakes me up at 2AM I'm at a disadvantage compared to someone who got a good night of sleep the night before the exam, or before an interview or a football game or a dance contest. The lady who doesn't hit any traffic on the way home has an advantage over the person who gets stuck in a traffic jam causes by an accident - she arrives in a better state of mind. With extreme ADD, it's harder for me to take long
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If you are too smart you fail. Finishing a test to quick, one three hour exam, I was out and down the pub having a counter meal whilst it was still one and got over 80, so I would fail, apparently (old school exam in front lecturers). They were kind enough to let me leave. When you get out of an exam a hour and a half early and know you did well, the counter meal and beer is real tasty. Now of course I would be failed for cheating ?!?
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"noticed something the Prof might want to check out" != "you fail for cheating".
Same as an in-person exam. In an in-person exam, If a student keeps pulling up their sleeve and looking at their forearm, that's a red flag that the in-person proctor is going to check out. A flag indicating something might be weird here - you might want to check it out.
If you finish extremely quickly, the software will point out that fact so that a TA or prof can consider if they want to check the video or not. If you'd been
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Are you suggesting that variability is caused by standardization?
Standardized testing does not create additional variability, but it does create opportunity for discriminatory behavior if people look at standardized tests and believe it can be a good way to compare students across different schools and backgrounds. Just something as simple as students having different levels of access to training targeted at standardized tests produces a significant disparity between the testing outcomes of students with different socioeconomic backgrounds.
Standardized tests can be a goo
Training for instructors could be an issue in pand (Score:2)
I mentioned I haven't seen an issue over several years. That would be pre-pandemic.
My instructors had about two-year lead time to get prepared for online instruction, to receive proper training.
In the pandemic, teachers were thrown into it with little to no training. In the time they had, they tried to prepare online courses - without being trained in how to do so. I wouldn't be at all surprised if some instructors don't have a good understanding of what the different flags actually mean and how to best fol
Re:No problems here. Prof can watch my video (Score:5, Informative)
Or they know exactly what it means but suspect their professor will take the flag as gospel rather than spending hours reviewing very boring videos.
For example, the first two paragraphs in TFA. Then there's:
Sarah Seyk, a nursing student at Sacramento City College, tried her best earlier this year to prepare for a competitive Proctorio-monitored exam. Between shifts in a covid-19 unit at a nursing home, she commandeered the quietest room in the house, her little sister’s, and walked around holding up her laptop camera to prove the space was clean and cheating-free.
Once the test started, though, she was kicked out three times, which she partially blames on her tendency of looking off-screen when lost in thought. Each time, she had to reverify her identity and the sanctity of her surroundings, burning vital time.
So, in other words perfectly normal non-cheating human behavior materially penalized by the software itself without appeal to the professor.
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So, in other words perfectly normal non-cheating human behavior materially penalized by the software itself without appeal to the professor.
Yes and we want less of that normal human behavior. [dilbert.com]
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You can surely understand how stressful it would be that simply having their eyes wander could be the source of accusations against them, can't you? I can.
I also understand the issue from the school's perspective. But there's a better way, at least some times: focus on essay questions. Not just an answer - make students argue their points, to show understanding. Not e.g. some "Name the stages of sviðræktun", but rather, "Explain the thought processes that led early Nordic settlers to engage in sv
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You do realize that having your eyes wander in an in person exam also frequently nets you an accusation of cheating right? It may be harmless in both cases, but it's certainly not unique to online exams.
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My eyes always wander when doing an exam if it takes any thinking. Ditto for any thinking task. Eyes will frequently wander up and to the side as I'm trying to move my memory to the proper location where related info is. The act of moving eyes and head links to moving around in memory even to different memories and information.
If further memory searching is necessary, even greater wandering will happen. I'm not looking for someone else's answers nor external information, just physical reaction to moving
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Agreed. Just pointing out that this isn't new to online proctoring. In person proctoring did the same thing.
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Except that it is. If it's in person, you can see whether the eyes are just aimlessly looking around - looking at the ceiling or whatnot - vs. looking at someone else's paper. But here... any wandering becomes suspicious.
Re:No problems here. Prof can watch my video (Score:4, Insightful)
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Essay questions require manual marking, which burns valuable paid hours, and introduces a subjective element into the process which could be biased.
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I was subject to so much discrimination in my school years that my parents had to sue my school into compliance. If I was to write an essay on something that affected me and picked that as the subject I'm sure it would go down like hot sick.
Re:No problems here. Prof can watch my video (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe if you looked at the article, you would have noticed the tweet that has a screen shot of the email that was sent to every student in the class.
Here is the complaint: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eh... [twimg.com]
It pretty much means that if anyone gets a "flag" they are going to be accused of cheating. It doesn't sound like they have the wrong idea what a "flag" means. At least, thats not what I'm getting from that email.
The email says the opposite (Score:2)
The email should definitely have been written differently, after the instructor considered their failure to communicate proper procedure well.
The (poorly written) email says that every student but one got flags. Which is pretty much the opposite of saying "only students who cheat get flags".
It does not say "every student was cheating". It does not say "if you get a flag you'll be accused of cheating".
The email SHOULD have been written in a different tone.
Other than perhaps the part about "don't resize your
Re:No problems here. Prof can watch my video (Score:5, Interesting)
So much so, yes. People who say there was a misunderstanding clearly didn't RTFA.
Room to dim, "you get a 0." Direct quote.
Can't see your body, camera cuts out, "you get a 0."
The one you linked to is great fodder for a religious discrimination claim, the message has it in all-caps and bold, so repeating the same as their posting to students, "NO HEAD COVERING FOR BOTH MALES AND FEMALES. THIS MEANS NO WHAT I CALL SKULL CAPS AND REGULAR CAPS." I hope that one results in multiple religious discrimination lawsuits.
There are so many things wrong this this, from beginning to end. I'd be up in arms if I was a student there, too.
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just put on that religious cap and when it goes to deans office they will just override that fail mark.
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fine let the dean deal with it and then I get rights to defend my self like an court trail
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Exactly. Just install a second monitor for mummy behind yours and she can see your mouse cursor and hence the questions and she can give your the multiple choice answers by holding up giant numbers you can see with your peripheral vision.
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There's a pre-exam and potentially mid-exam camera sweep, so you'd have to take measures against it. Perhaps place your cheat-aider under the desk, or have them roll under the bed when doing the sweep.
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Well, this is like some of the AI software that police use; the software can be a useful tool if the cops understand its limitation, but by in large they don't.
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Snowflakes don't get this, though. They automatically assume the worst and play victim. The same thing is going on in a traditional classroom, just not full disclosure like this company is doing.
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I am guessing you never worked IT helpdesk, or had created software for public use.
There is a large number (even if it is a small percentage) of people who just trust the computer blindly. So it if flagged as possible cheating, then they are going to give that student a big fat 0, or report them for correctional action.
Me: Here is list of data to review, these are points that the algorithm has on the border of being valid or not.
Them: Here you go they all look good.
Me: So we are Ok to go?
Them: Yes.
a Week o
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> I am guessing you never worked IT helpdesk, or had created software for public use.
Totfl. You win the internets today. Best "overlooking who I'm talking to" ever. Reminds me of early in my career when I was half a second from telling this dude to quit spamming the IETF list with off-topic messages when I realized the guy I was jumping on had the email address "v.cerf@...". Yeah, THAT Vint Cerf.
As to the rest of your post, yeah. See:
https://slashdot.org/comments.... [slashdot.org]
They're being groomed (Score:1, Offtopic)
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a problem with holding students at arms length (Score:2, Insightful)
I've taught, and I know there's a ton of work involved in what I'm suggesting here. I think it's worth it, though.
The core problem is the need to hold students at arms length. This is mainly done simply to save time during grading. To evaluate a student, you're usually asking them to fill out some multiple choice test or write an essay and send it in. Rarely will a teacher talk with a student as part of a test, ask for a verbal presentation, or a demonstration of mastery in a realistic environment. Extra t
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This is mainly done simply to save time during grading.
It's not just to save time - it's to allow things to be graded by non-experts, including computers. It's also to ensure that everyone is graded on the exact same content, in a standardized way.
My undergraduate quantum physics final was me, a chalkboard, a piece of chalk, and 45 minutes to explain to my professor how quantum physics worked. It remains the hardest test I ever took, and I think probably the most accurate assessment of what I knew that any test has produced. But it took 45 minutes of an expert'
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I feel the problem is how competitive grading is. Being that for students the top one a few points is the different from being top of the class to just in the mix, is often down to a single grade, to a student who is struggling, where one bad grade could put you at risk for failing.
Teachers know this, thus try to have a very objective way of grading. Where they can backup your grade very easily. Vs subjective where your personal like or dislike of the student can come into play, and be argued and fought ov
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When it gets to the point that people are resorting to pissing in cookware (or their pants), you've taken it too far.
So, how does one cheat at Gender Studies? (Score:2)
Asking for a friend.
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Re:So, how does one cheat at Gender Studies? (Score:5, Funny)
Only be sure always to call it please 'research'
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Plagiarism is how you become a journalist nowadays.
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No, the answer is "It's the man's fault. He's wrong. The woman is right."
Open-books tests (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Open-books tests (Score:4, Insightful)
I do something similar for my students. Not open book (because there are no really good books), but they can use all slides, their own notes and a summary of the lecture they wrote themselves. They can, of course, quote whatever they like in that summary and they are allowed to write notes and summary on a computer. It just has to be their own.
Result is that students that have some actual understanding pass with ease, but those that only learned facts by heart likely fail. I also got very positive feedback for the summary, most said writing it helped them a lot and was really valuable.
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And that really is what employers should care about, too. Who cares if a guy knows every single possible coding command in five different languages if he is completely unable to figure out the creative process of putting them together into even a simple Hello World! program? You want the guy with the imagination and the knowledge that this can be done - if he can just look up these three obscure commands on Google for the exact syntax.
Pretty much as it should be for physic :P (Score:3)
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My college tests are open book as well. I still use proctoring software. Why? Contract cheating, which means students having someone else take the tests for them. It's become quite common and there are lots of websites where you can hire yourself a contract cheater.
At a minimum you need some sort of proctoring solution to verify the identity of the test taker. Even with my recording solution (Respondus Lockdown Monitor, no cost to the students), I still have the occasional contract cheating happening. I eve
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How stringent do you have to be to detect a fake user? I suspect not much more than a remote-control-server-detector and a webcam?
Hmmn, I hadn't thought of remote-control servers: I'll bet a good RAT (remote access trojan) could defeat a simple proctoring scheme (;-))
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Open book is usually a trap. Some subjects you either know what you're doing or not. Having an open book isn't going to help you if you don't know it.
Famous last words - "I'll ace it, it's open book." They failed.
It's definitely a trap for what we used to call the "frantic scribblers". You know, the folks who thought it was a memory-work course and wrote down everything including the prof's jokes?
It's a good way to get them to understand that they're in a mixed facts-and-skills course (;-)) Preferably early in their first semester.
Automated anything is great when it works (Score:5, Insightful)
and becomes a nightmare when it doesn't.
I've recently had to sort out a complex tax issue in my new country of residence. No fucking way to do it with the web form. I tried to email real human beings to explain why the boilerplate computer system didn't help, and they kept sending me the instructional PDF with a link to the page that didn't work for me in the first place. This whole computer tax return thing turned out to be a major headeache it just didn't need to be.
Human interaction with public servants, proctors, driver's license examiner or whatever wasn't great before computers, but at least you had a chance to explain yourself if things didn't fit the usual pattern. With computers, my overwhelming feeling is always that you're guilty first, and then you have zero recourse if things go south, even when it's not your fault.
It's quite a sad world for us old timers, and I pity the young who grow up knowing no better. To survive computerization, I have a feeling they'll all end up being groomed to fit into the machine smoothly - which is rather a scary thought.
Re:Automated anything is great when it works (Score:4, Insightful)
I consider automation to be a multiplier. If everything's good, automation makes it better, but if there's some problem, automation makes it even worse.
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With computers, my overwhelming feeling is always that you're guilty first, and then you have zero recourse if things go south, even when it's not your fault.
This is because the general public can't figure simple shit out. It is almost always their fault, so the initial response is to assume that it is until proven otherwise.
I bet 90% of the people with "your problem" didn't read the instructions and couldn't figure it out. So 90% of the time, what they did is going to be the right solution. The challenge is setting up a robust enough system that you can determine the 10% of edge cases and handle them. Well, the first challenge is even understanding that you nee
Let's do our job (Score:5, Insightful)
I am a professor, and I am quite certain that I can find ways to test students effectively *without* half-assed software solutions.
In the simplest case, individual oral exams. Give me 20 minutes with a student and I can tell you what they know. You have to have another instructor present, so 40 intructor-minutes per person, but it works.
Project work. Follow up with some quick questions - it takes little time to detect students who didn't do the work themselves. Lots of other options as well...
tl;dr: there is a problem, but crappy proctoring software is not the solution. Schools and teachers doing their actual jobs, is the answer.
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"Give me 20 minutes with a student and I can tell you what they know. You have to have another instructor present, so 40 intructor-minutes per person, but it works."
Which means for a 30-person class (not that unusual in high school), you need 20 instructor-hours (not counting prep time) for the whole test. You'll be lucky if you have two.
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How long will you need to correct a written test[*]?
On an easy test you will need something like 5 minutes. On more complex stuff, you can easily spend north of 10, in particular in STEM.
Double-check test corrections by another instructor for another ~5 minutes, and you're spending well into 30-40% of your 20 instructor-hours anyway. It may get as far as 60-70% if the test is reasonably complex. The extra 8-12 hours is what it takes to survive a pandemic, so why the fuck is this such a giant problem?
[*] I'm
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Re:Let's do our job (Score:5, Interesting)
Thank you, Prof. bradley13.
I am now a retired Professor, having spent 35 years teaching. The practice of presenting lectures and readings to students, then isolating them for a limited time while provoking them with questions to which they write answers, has never been shown to be a good method of teaching nor of evaluating the results of teaching for all remembering very simple information. I am convinced that we stick to this method through thoughtless inertia rather than for any good pedagogical reasons.
There is some evidence that a short quiz on simple factual material is a good teaching device when followed immediately by confirmation of correct and incorrect answers. I have never seen evidence that the score on such a quiz is important, except that the must be few enough incorrect answers that the student can absorb the corrections.
During my active career, I experimented with project-driven courses, where the project had different levels which led to different grades stated in advance. I encouraged as much collaboration as students wished, but required each student to explain her/his work to me in a final interview.
I did not get very far with this alternate plan as an individual teacher, and there might be very different ideas that did not occur to me. But I think the teaching profession should definitely be exploring alternatives to lecture-read-test rather than putting all energy into enforcing strict rules in the exams.
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If you want to speed it up, you can spend 30 minutes with 3 stundents instead of 20 minutes with 1 student.
Congratulations, you just made it down to 50 hours.
Be a little creative in what you're asking, and you can make that 20 minutes. Now it's 1/3 of the initial time.
If that doesn't cut it for you, pick one of the open-book written tests. Of course, to do that, you'd need to actually... you know... be a competent teacher.
Yes, I did open-book physics tests with 150 peers as a stundent. In fact, roughly 50%
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I feel for you, but that's a problem with your university. No one should be expected to teach 150 students for an entire semester, with only 100 hours of compensation. That's literally impossible. You have 30-50 hours of instruction time (depending on your university), plus course preparation, plus coaching and
let people cheat (Score:3)
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someone else takes the test on the same network??? (Score:2)
someone else takes the test on the same network is an issue??
They think that the one use is 1 person taking the test at an time at home?
What about ISP that have ISP level NATing? where you don't get an real IPv4
Stop Hiring Based On Diplomas (Score:2)
anyone reminded of "The Lexx"? (Score:2)
Where citizens of The Cluster were raised inside boxes and taught by janky computer-based video? This is a kink even Orwell didn't think of, although Huxley veered pretty close.
All open book (Score:3)
When I was in college, all exams were open book and almost all were take home, including some which had time limits.
Are students less honest these days?
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I don't think students are any more or less honest today than they were 20 years ago, 40 years ago, or 100 years ago. In other words, you'll have a certain percentage of students who refuse to cheat. You'll have a smaller percentage of students who will cheat at any opportunity, if they think they can get away with it. The largest percentage of students a
bad tests drive cheating / cramming (Score:2)
bad tests drive cheating / cramming.
If the test questions don't cover real world setups cover stuff that you not really see out there?
And people need to cheat or just test cram with no real working skills what are testing?
Let people have open books and make the test in an way there just looking up the answers will fail them.
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It depends on the degree program and the institution. Just today I got/had to take a 173 question exit exam for a masters I am working on which saw me on the webcam for up to 3 hours. Before the test I got/had to calibrate things to make sure I was visible on the camera, show id (to the wizard), and then record a short video noting my surroundings for the test.
During the test, I was not permitted to use notes, no books, just my memory. I only had "Respondus Lockdown Browser", running as admin in order to ke
They need to go to prison. Period. (Score:3)
In the EU, that would be a given. So many basic rights violated, it's not even funny.
I don't know the US constitution and such by heart, but I doubt it's not also criminal there. Only the mindset of the judges needs to reflect that too. Like actually enforcing privacy-related stuff, and setting a precedent for how humans treat each other.
Teaching or breaking people? (Score:3)
chattr (Score:2)
If you allow the extensions to download and then make them -r and chattr them as root to be immuatable then Chrome will ignore them. At least for my kid's school's malware - YMMV.
Online universities are experiencing cheating (Score:3)
My son is attending a state university. With Covid, they've all gone online. There have multiple instances of students cheating during exams. In one situation, a group of students had identical wrong answers on an exam.
In another class, the students went to an online website to find answers to the test. The professor contacted the website administration and obtained a list of students using it so they're going to face some pretty tough sanctions. Personally, I hope they are expelled.
Many students are "gaming the system" and cheating now that some universities have online classes.
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Universities have experienced cheating for ages, there being plenty of ways... moving to online has just introduced a new set of ways to cheat.
Obligatory xkcd (Score:2)
https://xkcd.com/2385/ [xkcd.com]
Tired of this shit (Score:1)
Watch out, a highly charged, emotional, logic free post lies ahead...
I am fucking tired of this shit, We are being treated more and more like robots as the days and years grind on. We are no longer to be treated as people, but as robots, as threats, and as SLAVES. These assholes don't care if we go die in the gutter, but they will sure tear every last thing of value out of us before they discard us like a used condom.
You know what? I hope these students trash that school. I hope they burn the fucking build
Re: Tired of this shit (Score:2)
What I say is true. Look around, we are being treated like cattle, to be used, abused, and dehumanized before we are finally led to the slaughter (dying of stress related illness).
Every company wants to invade our privacy because there is a giant information brokerage boom going on right now. They don't care about the destructive effects this has on people, just as long as they can get their money and run.
While we are being abused, we are treated as threats in the form of devices locked down against their o
Why not (Score:1)
Analyze the language ? See if the person who wrote the thesis is the same that handed in everything else during the year ? AI should be able to do that pretty easy.
And the monitoring software will not see the screen behind the one the user is using.
This software can be gamed like anything else. Language analysis of the deliveries are much more difficult to fake.
Too good? (Score:2)
In most software, it is possible to operate the system with just the keyboard (and I don't mean mouse emulation). Is it going to penalize that as too few clicks? Or does it require the test software be poorly designed for accessibility?
So many problems here
The real problem is (Score:2)
that the modern degree is worthless anyway. We don't even ask for one any more - and I work in a university.
Quit and quit now. (Score:2)
Crying is blackmail (Score:2)
New webcam-based anti-cheating monitoring is so stressful, it's made some students cry
I don't see how some students crying makes any difference to whether the monitoring should be in place or not.
Any comparison of Suicide and/or depression rates (Score:2)
Lots of faulty / lofty assumptions. (Score:2)
What if you don't have a webcam? I don't - There's no way the school could force you to buy one, and they could never force you to use it, for clear and obvious privacy violations, so then what are you left with? They can track your mouse and keyboard, but that's making lofty assumptions that you're not getting misclicks, or mistypes, and they're assuming
What about RATs? (Score:2)
In another discussion, the subject of "remote access" tools bypassing browser-based proctoring schemes came up.
In your opinion, would a Remote Access Trojan be a good tool to use to bypass a pasted-on security scheme like a proctoring program?
What happened to the Honor System? (Score:2)
Just a test bed (Score:2)
"One system, Proctorio, uses gaze-detection, face-detection and computer-monitoring software to flag students for any "abnormal" head movement, mouse movement, eye wandering, computer window resizing, tab opening, scrolling, clicking, typing, and copies and pastes. A student can be flagged for finishing the test too quickly, or too slowly, clicking too much, or not enough. If the camera sees someone else in the background, a student can be flagged for having "multiple faces detected." If someone else takes
That name (Score:2)
"Proctorio"
Nice name. A clue to the ass raping to expect. Hope the software starts up with the snap of those blue gloves.
Not just school (Score:2)
This is being used in bar exams. In these, you are not dealing with a professor and 70 students, but you are dealing with 5000 examinees and the board of bar examiners.
Do you think that they are going to watch 4 hours of video? Will they actually allow you to finish the exam or shut it down when the AI figures out that you are cheating?
Re: (Score:2)
That is indeed the problem. People seem to either trust a computer completely or not at all
The computer doesn't make mistakes is the old slogan. The computer is very reliable and will run the programs exactly as it is told to do. However if that program has a flaw it will make mistakes. Or it is trying to make a judgement call, a properly programmed system would alert the user that something may be up.
Re: (Score:2)
Great.. then don't require running as admin. You should not be able to own a students system.
I was forced to install one of these bits of software today to take a test. As soon as the semester is over I will be adding my skills to ongoing reversing and documenting ways to bypass some of the more restrictive aspects of these apps.
Re: (Score:2)
At the very least, Respondus Lockdown Browser required installing as admin. I cannot recall off hand if it did at runtime, though even the install requirements were offensive.
Being uncomfortable installing it on a system with any PII, I spent some time trying to get Windows to boot from a USB drive or a VHD (to various degrees of failure), eventually my wife offered her Windows 10 S laptop... which of course it doesn't support because it's a native Win32 app not distributed through the Windows Store.
Recordi
Re: I develop one of these systems AMA (within rea (Score:2)
" Instead I'll be flattening the laptop used tomorrow as it can no longer be trusted"
Trusted computing, where your masters order you to trust THEM, just because.
It's a shame you will have to take such a drastic step, but with all of the hidden, secret, locked down against you bullshit that might be lurking inside that machine, I don't blame you.
Re: (Score:2)
Not sure about these days but 5 or so years ago when I was first asked to look at the Respondus Lockdown Browser it simply relied on your user-agent string containing a certain value.
Re: (Score:2)
I've heard that said as well, and I've not had time to investigate it at present, however given the 'browser' had my cam on and streaming that feed... somewhere, including having some basic AI to detect that my face stayed in frame, I suspect there may be a little more going on now.
Re: (Score:2)
and flagging stuff what about ADA issues?? does the deans office get the video for them to review if an student wants to fight and cheating case?
Re: (Score:2)
Sue the school on the basis that the software they use is a national security risk for Canada.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, but this concept doesn't account for grifters and psychopaths, and devalues the degrees of the honest students.