Dishonor Code: What Happens When Cheating Becomes the Norm?
fliptop writes:
Students say they are getting 'screwed over' for sticking to the rules. Professors say students are acting like 'tyrants.' Then came ChatGPT:
When it was time for Sam Beyda, then a freshman at Columbia University, to take his Calculus I midterm, the professor told students they had 90 minutes.
But the exam would be administered online. And even though every student was expected to take it alone, in their dorms or apartments or at the library, it wouldn't be proctored. And they had 24 hours to turn it in.
"Anyone who hears that knows it's a free-for-all," Beyda told me.
[...] For decades, campus standards have been plummeting. The hallowed, ivy-draped buildings, the stately quads, the timeless Latin mottos-all that tradition and honor have been slipping away. That's an old story. Then Covid struck and all bets were off. With college kids doing college from their bedrooms and smartphones, and with the explosion of new technology, cheating became not just easy but practically unavoidable. "Cheating is rampant," a Princeton senior told me. "Since Covid there's been an increasing trend toward grade inflation, cheating, and ultimately, academic mediocrity."
Now that students are back on campus, colleges are having a hard time putting the genie back in the bottle. Remote testing combined with an array of tech tools-exam helpers like Chegg, Course Hero, Quizlet, and Coursera; messaging apps like GroupMe and WhatsApp; Dropbox folders containing course material from years past; and most recently, ChatGPT, the AI that can write essays-have permanently transformed the student experience.
[...] On January 2, a Princeton University computer science major named Edward Tian-who may be the most hated man on campus-tweeted: "I spent New Years building GPTZero-an app that can quickly and efficiently detect whether an essay is ChatGPT or human written."
So now it's nerd vs. nerd, and one of the nerds is going to win-probably whoever gets more venture funding. Everything is up in the air.
Previously:
- Amid ChatGPT Outcry, Some Teachers are Inviting AI to Class
- Seattle Public Schools Bans ChatGPT; District 'Requires Original Thought and Work From Students'
- ChatGPT Arrives in the Academic World
Read more of this story at SoylentNews.