Beating cheating

The article fails to notice that the error lies in exams and tests instead.

If a student can find the answer on his internet-equipped mobile during the test, then he can do the same in real life and probably needed not to memorize the answer at all.

Too many tests and exams rely on regurgitating useless data. Such exams are easier to create than ones testing skills and qualities, tickle vanity of dusty academics, but are outdated in the internet age.

Mr. Common Sense,

I do agree with your argument that most exams rely on regurgitating useless data, but test-takers are expected to know that useless rudimentary data. If in real life you are relying on internet to find very basic science skills then you better not appear for exams. Moreover, before putting any correct answers on the internet someone has to find those answers manually.

However, Testing academic abilities of millions of students is not easy task.

The reason for the sudden request by the Japanese government on March 1st was the spate of online cheating at 4 universities (all by the same individual) utilizing real-time crowdsourcing of test answers via mobile phones. The individual in question was arrested yesterday (March 3rd), but I suspect he is actually an accomplice for the true beneficiary (his girlfriend maybe?) who merely had to browse the website in question without leaving a trace.

This is a fascinating example of evolving intelligence. From a different perspective this student was utilizing modern technology and techniques. Our intelligence is layered, we learn short-cuts and equations to speed the process of discerning our surroundings and understanding. What we have here is an innovative example of such, initially judged as cheating.

My claim above is far too strong, for example copying & pasting into google and the same onto the test, why you wouldn't even have to know what classroom you were in -- yet there's a facet to this that is an example of utilizing the technology existent. Makes one wonder how to frame the tests in the future because these events are only going to be more common. Yet it's not all bad is what i'm sayin'. Brings to mind the intro to Wicksteed's Economic treatise.

In my university in Portugal, I was allowed to use anything I wanted. I used to take my laptop do my exams and be on msn during them.
Of course with unlimited access to information you better know before hand what you are looking for, otherwise by the time you find it, the exam is over. Its a process of making people smart and efficient rather than momorizers.

The problem is "meritocracy". The earning ability of millions of people depends on how well they do on some random tests. Whether these test are indicators of the true abilities of the test-takers, who knows.

Example: X is a very good student and test taker. He gets into the best bussiness school in the world and from then on he has the guarantee of a high power, high paying job. He will be well paid to play with other people's money (and to boss others around) all his life. Obviously, after the test the true abilities of X will never be assessed again (the success of a manager is often the success of his/her subordinates, b.s. and connections matter, etc.).

So: if cheating on one test can put you on a path to financial and professional success many people will keep trying. The problem, in my opinion (after successfuly taking many life-changing tests) is not the cheating, but the sistem that judges the people (and implicitly sentences them) basen on some test score.

Dear Sir
The great problem fully missed on this quite sensitive issue is the growing of specialized groups outside the academy and schools involving professional students , instructors, officers,militaries etc, all given support (solving exams's questions!) to the branche of Professional criminal Mafias specialized in selling "help" in real time and on line for all those students ready to cheat exams -really high tech electronic gadgets are used -professional spy stuf !
Certainly, things are getting more and more subtle and worse!. By now, it is widely suspected that there are many Instructors involved in such Cheat Mafias who receive considerable amount of bribery dirty money and benefits just to make exams more and more difficults ,but with the clear target on stimulating such new criminal mafia market on Colleges and Universities.
But worse of all is that all those students using such criminal protocol of "helping in exams and class works assignements" in an apparent innocent way , end up sooner or later deeply involved in others criminal Mafias activities branches like ;Making pornographic adult movies, traffic of drugs, prostitution , etc...The mobsters only "help" those students that are ready to get dirty as "security key " of the cheat action !.Very devilishly indeed !.

My thermodynamics professor had a much better way of dealing with this problem... and it required no fancy cameras, monitoring, or software.

He made every exam was 'open world'... which means that ANY resource can be used during the exam. However, his tests were absolutely brutal and proctored under a strict time limit. If a student didn't immediately know exactly what they were doing, it would be impossible to finish the exam within the hour.

In the end, all those textbooks, laptops, friends, notes, and whatever else didn't really help anyone. Unless you knew your stuff and exactly where to look, you would run out of time trying to 'find' the answers in your textbook / internet / whatever...

KevinSchnider,

I agree with you that it is possible to make up the test in a way that excludes any possibility of cheating. And some professors get really good at it. I had a couple of those back in college.

However, the problem arises with standardized tests that are taken by endless bullions of people, like admission exams and certificate exams. Unlike in a course exam, you can't possibly test all the material, or score open answers in reasonable time.

It is possible to cheat on a standardized exam simply because it is standardized. And there is no easy way out of this. If you raise the difficulty level, exam takers will guestimate too much, and you will have to curve the admission score accordingly. If you engage in an arms race, students will eventually outsmart you, since they are the younger and more tech savvy generation anyway.

I think the best solution is to deviate from a standardized test, and go back to individual interview-like exam, where you solve a set of problems, then stand up in front of a commission and defend your answers. Each university then has the option of making up their own exams to match expectations and select students with a set of skills and knowledge suitable for the particular program.

@NextRim

Videoconferencing makes your system semi viable but it still restricts the pool of qualified applicants. By all agreeing to accept the scores from a similar test, universities save themselves the expense of having to do personal interviews for 4000 applicants every year. Harvard or Yale can afford to but small universities rely on the tests to screen out the huge number of applicants.

One might suppose cheating one's way into a university, particularly where the expected work level is going to be well above one's abilities, is like jumping from the frying pan into the fire -- understandable for the prestige it brings among peers, but ultimately a self-defeating and irrational act.

Here in Ontario, Canada.....ummmmm........how to phrase this.... happily, there now seems to be a prominent cottage industry that changes this dismal picture. Once admitted, those attempting such an illicit end-run know, there is a not-even-very-discreet-any-more service sector at one's disposal of "essay research and editing services" (they advertise heavily on the power poles around the various university campuses, especially the University of Toronto downtown)that can help such "students" get their desired degrees effortlessly (even post-graduate degrees), and without any need for even an unbearably tedious modicum of traditional skill development. I personally see no evidence that the universities themselves care enough to separate out, and stop, this cohort of students from graduating. As a strategy, therefore, cheating your way into a good Ontario university, "facilitating" ones graduation by the same methods, then squeezing out more deserving candidates in the competition for good jobs, appears to pay off and appears quite doable.

Is the situation the same in other countries, I wonder?

Many students cheat because they see that that's the way to succeed in this greedy world. They see it happening in the financial world (Wall Street, investment banks, advertising, ...) in the political world especially on an international scale (doesn't China cheat by not respecting copyright laws?).
If you don't want our children to cheat we have to totally overhaul societal values. Kids learn from grown-ups.

Perhaps one problem is the fact that the standardized test market has been cornered by a relatively small number of businesses. It wouldn't be so easy to cheat on the Educational Testing Service's exams were it not for the fact that the vast majority of students seeking entry to US graduate programs have to take the GRE, one of their standardized tests which is administered by Prometric.

Assessing a student’s capability and potential can come in a variety of ways. A single paper-and-pencil test (especially the multiple choice/completion) is not the best measurement, it should be phased out gradually. Instead, a triangulation of assessment procedures would be more valid and reliable, though that will take a lot of good examiners’ effort and time. Nevertheless, it will reduce and minimize the effect of cheating.

Cheating in tests is as old as the test itself. With the advent of new communication technology, it could get worse, not to mention the increasingly widespread of plagiarism nowadays.

Honesty is virtuous. But how many of us are? (btt1943, vzc1943)

the test should examine thinking skills, not memorized levels of data.