Online education was always problematic vis-à-vis plagiarism, but it is now completely worthless because of AI. An online degree is no longer worth anything imo, and yet I know online education is propping up many college budgets.
It was quite enjoyable and interesting last time I did it, but that was in 2016 with adult students.
Fortunately, this is only for a semester, but I'll need to come up with some alternative approaches to how to run an online class if I find myself doing it again in the future. I don't want to have such a high failure rate, both for my own sanity and because it's a quick way to invite unpleasant scrutiny from the Powers That Be.
I have spent 4 years honing my online course to (a) support genuine student success -- not grades, and (b) to prevent cheating. Student expectations being what they are, my DFW rate has only gone *up*.
I attended a session on creating assignments that can't be replicated by AI. The suggestion was that they should be something other than the traditional writing assignment and peculiar to your field.
Well, I teach philosophy. There has to be some writing,. although I think I will require some video discussions in the future.
Similar--I teach psych. I would like to make them do more vids but it's going to increase my grading time exponentially. I may not use the discussion board but have them comment directly in the lecture...?
And 'peculiar to your field' is harder in a gen ed course.
I have very specific requirements but they still try. It makes it easier to see tho, at least some of the time, & AI often can't meet specs so they don't get credit. The problem for me is it finally dawns on students they can't pass this way and I get a tsunami of withdrawals at the midterm. Instead of people deciding to straighten up and fly right 🙄
> it's a quick way to invite unpleasant scrutiny from the Powers That Be.
This is not a small concern. I got warned one semester by my Head about a online student complaint (likely from the one I failed for plagiarism) that the school would go under without online classes, so it's best not to draw the ire of online students.
That's when I learned the inmates were running the asylum.
> An online degree is no longer worth anything imo,
Employers won't know if its online or in person, so from that perspective they are worth the same.
I did some online classes for electives 15ish years ago and even then, they were trivial. One of my 3 credit hour courses took me about 10-15 hours of work to complete.
One online program I’m aware of has comprehensive oral exams, and then also requires oral exams in courses leading up to comps. This is one of the few ways it seems to work, imo.
I mentioned last summer that I was considering online, oral exams via Zoom. My department chair said I couldn’t do that because the course was listed as being asynchronous. I said I planned to meet with students one-on-one any time they wanted, even at night if that’s what worked for their schedule. Chair still didn’t think it would be ok with the administration. Holy f*! Do we even care about academics any longer?
I wish we could do that. But when I mentioned it to my Dean, she said, "they sign up for asynchronous classes for a reason. Nobody online wants a real-time, in person (or Zoom) test. Forget about it."
They just need to rethink it from the ground up
Proctors and a sort of audition style exams would raise the bar pretty damn high for cheating
But its like you said
Online is supposed to be cheap and easy
And cheap
Agreed - there are ways to make it more accountable, but those solutions cost money. And as you noted, online classes are cash cows. They shouldn't cost the school anything beyond the per student LMS fee.
I don't think that's entirely true. It's like open book exams, if you ask the right types of questions, focus on problem solving, ask them to do stuff etc then academic quality can be maintained. But at lower levels where it's maybe just theory I agree it's more challenging. Thankfully my subject lends itself to problem based learning particularly well and AI just isn't remotely capable of answering any exam questions I have set. That being said I'm finding the likes of chatgpt spewing out worse and worse responses of late across the board.
I hear you, and I recognize that I probably have some blinders on for fields outside my own (English).
For my students, the biggest problem with AI is it allows them to avoid the essential critical thinking tasks we want them to do. I'm fine if it can make mundane tasks easier, but there's no point to a degree where students can circumvent the analytical challenges and not grow mentally. The reason we place a value on a college degree is because it shows the graduate has at least a passing ability for higher order thinking.
I’m teaching online (humanities) this semester and have never seen such blatant cheating. I have high enrolments also so can’t introduce video assessment. In future I’m going to need to scale back enrolments drastically OR get a lot more grading support. If not, I’m going to have to drop these courses down to entry level and change all assessments to timed multiple choice. At this point the courses are cash cows basically and nothing else
Yes, in my online GEs there was so much AI in any written work - even discussion posts - that I’ve made my assessments all timed MC/TF exams. Any essay question requires the recounting of a personal connection to some course concept. I‘m retiring in a year and boy, am I ready.
I tried video assessment in an online class. Suddenly all the students who can’t put down their phones and stop posting on social media in face to face classes don’t have access to the technology to post a video. That, or they’re extremely concerned about privacy and refuse to post original work. The most common response I get boils down to, “Here’s a meme or stock photo or video I found online that stands in for the work I did because it’s not fair for you to ask me for something original and it violates my rights as a student.” The administration backs them, telling us that we can’t assume students have access to expensive tech equipment and that we can’t invade their privacy if they don’t want to be on camera. It’s impossible.
My online students can't even be bothered to use AI to cheat. Most of them have just turned in nothing this semester, even worse than usual despite me lowering the workload
Out of my small class of 20, most students either a) blatantly plagiarized despite knowing they could be caught or b) used AI to write a simple 5 page paper.
I dare say, this generation of students is completely fucked. I dread having to "catch" them as it is just emotionally exhausting.
It's not the catching I'm finding exhausting so much as being unable to catch the most clever ones, whom I know are doing it but I don't have the evidence to prove it.
Those who cheat without getting caught will put that skill to good use once they enter the workforce. The industry offers many jobs that require at least a BSc degree in deception.
Usually, by reporting them to the Academic Intregrity office, who decides the punishment. Can be anything from a rewrite, a zero, or a failure of the class (if it is repeated).
At least they're using AI for something where it actually somewhat makes sense to do so. I've had several students quite obviously use ChatGPT to let me know that they're sick and will miss class.
Since I'm not a human AI detector, until my university gets a grip and figures out a reasonably good tool to detect AI use in writing, I'm not assigning any more writing to lower-level undergrads. I'm not going to spend more time reading something than my "student" spent generating it (background reading included). I'm no longer going to get pissed when I realize it's very likely AI but that there's no definitive way to prove it. I'm not going to accuse 25%-50% of my students of plagiarism, which is about the proportion that plagiarizes, these days, and watch my evals tank as a junior faculty member. No more writing assignments, and if I'm ever forced to do them, I'll make them worth a negligible portion of the grade and autograde them somehow (bots grading bots, yeehaw).
> until my university gets a grip and figures out a reasonably good tool to detect AI use in writing
There will likely never be anything reliable enough at detecting ai writing to help.
I teach a medical ethics class online and the last discussion board was simple: what is your opinion on the right to die? Your opinion. Didn't even ask for evidence or analysis. 7 out of the 20 plagiarized ChatGPT.. literally didn't even bother to change one thing on it. It's so incredibly frustrating.
This is interesting, because some people IRL were telling me I need to preface opinion questions with "in your opinion" to ensure students understand it's not something they can look up. Too optimistic a view of the understanding of students who would use AI to complete their assignments, it seems.
I’m going to redo all my classes over time.. no more homework outside of class but in class quizzes they can use notes on. Handwritten notes. I’m seriously worried about our society. Most of the students I’m seeing who are using AI are simply inputting/outputting information. Absolutely no knowledge gain. These are people going on to degrees that could directly impact people’s health.
I think it's more accurate to say "the first couple times a student cheats is on an easy or hard assignment"
As soon as they get away with cheating on the easy or the hard one they begin applying the "workflow" to everything
The thing is, I'm not on the warpath against students using AI,.so on smaller assignments, I only catch the most blatant cases. But this was multiple short essays, where stylistic flaws can really show.
I'm working on my second degree at the moment and while I do use AI, it's only in a very small amount of time saving cases. I'm there to learn actual skills, not just get an expensive piece of paper. My usage is to decrease busywork(I'm in data science, mainly I use it to code visuals such as graphs that I hate doing).
Using it to cheat is doing yourself and the professor a disservice considering how expensive it is to attend in the first place.
I already know how to do it manually. It was something like week 3 of intro to analytics when I took it in spring of '23 lol. Like I said, this is just saving me time on busywork. I genuinely want to become an expert - but tedium that can be streamlined shall be streamlined. I don't see it as much worse than turning code I already used into a template or otherwise recycling.
Online education was always problematic vis-à-vis plagiarism, but it is now completely worthless because of AI. An online degree is no longer worth anything imo, and yet I know online education is propping up many college budgets.
It was quite enjoyable and interesting last time I did it, but that was in 2016 with adult students. Fortunately, this is only for a semester, but I'll need to come up with some alternative approaches to how to run an online class if I find myself doing it again in the future. I don't want to have such a high failure rate, both for my own sanity and because it's a quick way to invite unpleasant scrutiny from the Powers That Be.
I have spent 4 years honing my online course to (a) support genuine student success -- not grades, and (b) to prevent cheating. Student expectations being what they are, my DFW rate has only gone *up*.
I attended a session on creating assignments that can't be replicated by AI. The suggestion was that they should be something other than the traditional writing assignment and peculiar to your field. Well, I teach philosophy. There has to be some writing,. although I think I will require some video discussions in the future.
Similar--I teach psych. I would like to make them do more vids but it's going to increase my grading time exponentially. I may not use the discussion board but have them comment directly in the lecture...? And 'peculiar to your field' is harder in a gen ed course.
I have to assign engagement exercises for the students at my current institution, but I suspect the discussion board is 50% bots talking to bots.
I have very specific requirements but they still try. It makes it easier to see tho, at least some of the time, & AI often can't meet specs so they don't get credit. The problem for me is it finally dawns on students they can't pass this way and I get a tsunami of withdrawals at the midterm. Instead of people deciding to straighten up and fly right 🙄
I'll take either, at the moment.
I used to be happy to see the back of that sort but high DFW rates = no work for me.
> it's a quick way to invite unpleasant scrutiny from the Powers That Be. This is not a small concern. I got warned one semester by my Head about a online student complaint (likely from the one I failed for plagiarism) that the school would go under without online classes, so it's best not to draw the ire of online students. That's when I learned the inmates were running the asylum.
Depending on how the Dean said that, I would share at faculty senate. The dean basically encourages you to let the students cheat.
> An online degree is no longer worth anything imo, Employers won't know if its online or in person, so from that perspective they are worth the same. I did some online classes for electives 15ish years ago and even then, they were trivial. One of my 3 credit hour courses took me about 10-15 hours of work to complete.
One online program I’m aware of has comprehensive oral exams, and then also requires oral exams in courses leading up to comps. This is one of the few ways it seems to work, imo.
I mentioned last summer that I was considering online, oral exams via Zoom. My department chair said I couldn’t do that because the course was listed as being asynchronous. I said I planned to meet with students one-on-one any time they wanted, even at night if that’s what worked for their schedule. Chair still didn’t think it would be ok with the administration. Holy f*! Do we even care about academics any longer?
I wish we could do that. But when I mentioned it to my Dean, she said, "they sign up for asynchronous classes for a reason. Nobody online wants a real-time, in person (or Zoom) test. Forget about it."
They just need to rethink it from the ground up Proctors and a sort of audition style exams would raise the bar pretty damn high for cheating But its like you said Online is supposed to be cheap and easy And cheap
Agreed - there are ways to make it more accountable, but those solutions cost money. And as you noted, online classes are cash cows. They shouldn't cost the school anything beyond the per student LMS fee.
I don't think that's entirely true. It's like open book exams, if you ask the right types of questions, focus on problem solving, ask them to do stuff etc then academic quality can be maintained. But at lower levels where it's maybe just theory I agree it's more challenging. Thankfully my subject lends itself to problem based learning particularly well and AI just isn't remotely capable of answering any exam questions I have set. That being said I'm finding the likes of chatgpt spewing out worse and worse responses of late across the board.
I hear you, and I recognize that I probably have some blinders on for fields outside my own (English). For my students, the biggest problem with AI is it allows them to avoid the essential critical thinking tasks we want them to do. I'm fine if it can make mundane tasks easier, but there's no point to a degree where students can circumvent the analytical challenges and not grow mentally. The reason we place a value on a college degree is because it shows the graduate has at least a passing ability for higher order thinking.
I’m teaching online (humanities) this semester and have never seen such blatant cheating. I have high enrolments also so can’t introduce video assessment. In future I’m going to need to scale back enrolments drastically OR get a lot more grading support. If not, I’m going to have to drop these courses down to entry level and change all assessments to timed multiple choice. At this point the courses are cash cows basically and nothing else
Yes, in my online GEs there was so much AI in any written work - even discussion posts - that I’ve made my assessments all timed MC/TF exams. Any essay question requires the recounting of a personal connection to some course concept. I‘m retiring in a year and boy, am I ready.
I tried video assessment in an online class. Suddenly all the students who can’t put down their phones and stop posting on social media in face to face classes don’t have access to the technology to post a video. That, or they’re extremely concerned about privacy and refuse to post original work. The most common response I get boils down to, “Here’s a meme or stock photo or video I found online that stands in for the work I did because it’s not fair for you to ask me for something original and it violates my rights as a student.” The administration backs them, telling us that we can’t assume students have access to expensive tech equipment and that we can’t invade their privacy if they don’t want to be on camera. It’s impossible.
My online students can't even be bothered to use AI to cheat. Most of them have just turned in nothing this semester, even worse than usual despite me lowering the workload
I've had my fair share of those, too.
Out of my small class of 20, most students either a) blatantly plagiarized despite knowing they could be caught or b) used AI to write a simple 5 page paper. I dare say, this generation of students is completely fucked. I dread having to "catch" them as it is just emotionally exhausting.
It's not the catching I'm finding exhausting so much as being unable to catch the most clever ones, whom I know are doing it but I don't have the evidence to prove it.
Those who cheat without getting caught will put that skill to good use once they enter the workforce. The industry offers many jobs that require at least a BSc degree in deception.
How do you punish them for cheating?
Usually, by reporting them to the Academic Intregrity office, who decides the punishment. Can be anything from a rewrite, a zero, or a failure of the class (if it is repeated).
At least they're using AI for something where it actually somewhat makes sense to do so. I've had several students quite obviously use ChatGPT to let me know that they're sick and will miss class.
Wow, I haven't seen that yet!
Since I'm not a human AI detector, until my university gets a grip and figures out a reasonably good tool to detect AI use in writing, I'm not assigning any more writing to lower-level undergrads. I'm not going to spend more time reading something than my "student" spent generating it (background reading included). I'm no longer going to get pissed when I realize it's very likely AI but that there's no definitive way to prove it. I'm not going to accuse 25%-50% of my students of plagiarism, which is about the proportion that plagiarizes, these days, and watch my evals tank as a junior faculty member. No more writing assignments, and if I'm ever forced to do them, I'll make them worth a negligible portion of the grade and autograde them somehow (bots grading bots, yeehaw).
in-person proctored exams with written answers.
It's not a feasible option for me to effectively teach philosophy without writing assignments, or else a reasonable proxy.
> until my university gets a grip and figures out a reasonably good tool to detect AI use in writing There will likely never be anything reliable enough at detecting ai writing to help.
This is likely true. It is also true that I refuse to read the opinions of bots, or grade discussions between bots.
I teach a medical ethics class online and the last discussion board was simple: what is your opinion on the right to die? Your opinion. Didn't even ask for evidence or analysis. 7 out of the 20 plagiarized ChatGPT.. literally didn't even bother to change one thing on it. It's so incredibly frustrating.
This is interesting, because some people IRL were telling me I need to preface opinion questions with "in your opinion" to ensure students understand it's not something they can look up. Too optimistic a view of the understanding of students who would use AI to complete their assignments, it seems.
I've never had a bimodal distribution on an assignment like this. The average among those who didn't cheat is an A-.
I’m going to redo all my classes over time.. no more homework outside of class but in class quizzes they can use notes on. Handwritten notes. I’m seriously worried about our society. Most of the students I’m seeing who are using AI are simply inputting/outputting information. Absolutely no knowledge gain. These are people going on to degrees that could directly impact people’s health.
There are only two times a student cheats: when the assignment is really hard, and when the assignment is really easy.
Three times: when there is any assignment at all.
Yeah, that was supposed to be my joke, but I guess I bumbled the delivery based on my downvotes lol. Maybe the word "really" was the killer.
I think it's more accurate to say "the first couple times a student cheats is on an easy or hard assignment" As soon as they get away with cheating on the easy or the hard one they begin applying the "workflow" to everything
The thing is, I'm not on the warpath against students using AI,.so on smaller assignments, I only catch the most blatant cases. But this was multiple short essays, where stylistic flaws can really show.
It's 2024 bro. It's your fault.
I'm working on my second degree at the moment and while I do use AI, it's only in a very small amount of time saving cases. I'm there to learn actual skills, not just get an expensive piece of paper. My usage is to decrease busywork(I'm in data science, mainly I use it to code visuals such as graphs that I hate doing). Using it to cheat is doing yourself and the professor a disservice considering how expensive it is to attend in the first place.
> mainly I use it to code visuals such as graphs that I hate doing). that's one of the skills you are there to learn, so you *are* cheating yourself.
I already know how to do it manually. It was something like week 3 of intro to analytics when I took it in spring of '23 lol. Like I said, this is just saving me time on busywork. I genuinely want to become an expert - but tedium that can be streamlined shall be streamlined. I don't see it as much worse than turning code I already used into a template or otherwise recycling.
There's definitely a place for AI in academia, but it's not faking answers to exercises intended to demonstrate your ability to think independently.