I totally disagree with this statement. If we allow students to cheat in our classes, they will think that it is ok to cheat in other classes. They will feel that since they got away with it in one class, they can achieve this feat in another. Cheating should not be tolerated in any circumstance. Students learn nothing from cheating. Cheating also disrupts the integrity of the institution. Some students feel that programs/websites like Turnitin.com are unfair because these programs/sites infringe on their right to cheat. I feel they are effective teaching tools for students. These programs/sites helps students to understand that cheating is neither a right nor a privilege.
Great thoughts - I agree! - Jon
Dr. Outland, we should be concerned with cheating regardless of the learning environment. Just because cheating may occur in traditional classe does not justify cheating in the online setting.
Question? Are there certain measures that can be taken within the platform and/or incorporated into assessment techniques to minimize cheating?
Thanks,
George
Research already proves that the incidents of cheating in f2f are equal or higher than those in online. The difference is that online is easier catch and more obvious. Thankfully, there are more tools available for online and I believe online faculty take it much more seriously than traditional campus faculty.
On another note, again I was very frustrated that the quiz for this unit asked for information that was not covered in the content of the unit. CEE is breaking the same rules they are trying to teach. It is extremely demotivating and misaligned to assess on information not provided to the learner. This is a key concept so I was very surprised to find this occurring now in both units so far.
In addition, I disagree with several areas of content in this unit. Group work can clearly be done in sync environments and sync challenges are no less then you find in a f2f class. Guest speakers can be brought into a sync activity, and the DB is much more flexible than this course implies. You would definitely discourage a student from asking questions in the DB unless they are specifically related to the topic of the thread or unless you set up a thread just on course questions. Otherwise the DB will become an info area not a discussion of the topic area.
Finally, there are more to assessments than exams and quizzes, especially for adult learners. Project based assessments work extremely well in online and the use of a drop box feature instead of email is a much more efficient approach to submission.
Dr. Jeannette K. Jones
George, I am taking the opportunity to respond to your question. The best mechanism to prevent cheating is the diligent instructor. I teach online and the institution I teach for uses TurnItIn. TurnItIn is a plagiarism prevention service. This service maintains a database of documents that student text documents are compared against to determine how much of the student work is original. This is a great service, but only works for text documents. Student deliverables can be other types of documents which are not checked. So it falls back on the instructor (subject matter expert) to determine whether cheating has taken place. Without the diligence of the instructor, cheating in the online classroom would be rampant.
I disagree with the statement that we should not be concerned about cheating in the online classroom. Academic honest is a big issue with me and I continually campaign against academic dishonesty. As instructors we should be concerned about cheating whether it takes place in a traditional classroom or an online classroom. If we are not concerned and do not take steps to preserve academic integrity, who will? Cheating is cheating and the result is a devalued learning experience for everyone, even those who do not engage in it.
Cheating is cheating and needs to be addressed the same, be it on-line or in a classroom setting.
George,
Great question. If you are using multiple choice type assignments, you can shuffle question order and answers within the question. Another option is to use more writing based assessments, and then check them against something like "Turnitin.com"
Thanks,
Jon
I agree - it just may take different forms and require different strategies to combat it. - Jon
Plagiarism is an ongoing problem. Fortunately in the online environment there is Turnitin that checks written submitted work for originality verification. Basically an instructor can see if too much cut/paste was used.
I agree 100% with Mark. I give my students every opportunity to learn from their mistakes and their grade is more repesentative of their tenacity and motivation (which in turn is a more accurate predictor of future success than high grades are). Learning does not necessarily involve getting it right the first time. Some institutions allow the instructors to establish their own grading policies. This is not the institution's policy on cheating; it is the instructor's policy on grading.
Patrick, many students do not know that TurnItIn cannot compare against hard-copy books and documents unless the text has been used before and has made it into their database. It continues to amaze me how many students just want to find the information on the Internet instead of cracking a book.
Cheating online and onground is a given. I'm just putting that out there. There have been numerous articles written just in 2009 on how college students no longer perceive cheating as academic dishonesty – the "system" is antagonistic and the path of least resistance to the greatest reward is encouraged.
Additionally, given technological advances "googling" as verb has been replaced with "iPhoning" we, as educators can build barriers to impede cheating, but as my father always said, you build an 8' wall so the "bad guys" know to build a 10' fence.
My approach has been to redesign quizzes, which I use as study guides allowing 2 attempts, and midterms and exams so if a student were to spend the time looking up each question they could never finish the exam…and the results have been quite revealing and consistent over the past 5 years.
Cheating will always occur, how we respond and react to it as educators is the more relevant question I feel.
Cheating online is just as easily accomplished as if they were attending an on-ground university. With the online environment, students from my class, may know other students who have already passed through or about to... allowing them to trade papers or projects. The same goes for their exit exam. Students can easily use their exam and pass it onto others.
To identify the amount of cheating, use turnitin.
To limit prevent cheating, change the subjects (case study, database) every session, and ley the students know ahead of time, that the next session there is another subject. It sometimes help.
I agree that we should not be overly concerned about cheating in an online course. We have to assume that the reason someone is taking the online class is to advance their knowledge and just like land classes - little knowledge is gained through cheating
Great thoughts - thanks! - Jon
Ron,
Great thoughts on how you work through this.
Jon
Cheating is both a problem a nd situation of life that has to be addressed. People are less than honest on their tax return, so why is cheating in a class so bad is a question I hear often. It is very much an ethical issue as well as a morale responsiblity.
Cheating can happen in any forum. I have witnessed even couples taking a class one after another and using the same paper. There are a lot of sophisticated tools now adays to detect plagarism and cheating. I think instructors need to identify early on in the course that there is no tolerance for this behavior.
