hi chat I need your help writing an essay
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Everyone Is Cheating Their Way Through College
ChatGPT has unraveled the entire academic project..
New York magazine:
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My colleagues and I are talking about this article. It's truly distressing. And some of them didn't have any sense that this is happening to the extent it is.
I started changing a lot of the assessments I do in fall 2023 because of ChatGPT, but what I do doesn't work in all classes, and then some instructors haven't even adapted any of their classes....
But anyway, yeah, things are bad and they're going to get worse....
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I'm getting geared up to start an "I'm retired now" thread, just as soon as I finish grading this last batch of papers, so I no longer have as much skin in the game. (Of course, we all have skin in the game when current events seem poised to make the people who will run the world when we're in our twilight years as ignorant as possible, but I digress.).
Anyway. I have seen some AI work cross my desk, and I've probably been fooled by some, but it's a heavier lift for AI to generate a convincing creative assignment, especially one that convincingly imitates the naivete of a nineteen-year-old's first attempt at fiction. Nevertheless, if I weren't retiring, I would be considering steps like having them do in-class assignments by hand in blue books. They would be miserable to grade, since everybody's handwriting has declined in recent decades, including mine, but they would show that I meant business. I would set the grading scale so that you couldn't pass without writing something in class that was at least plausible.
There may already be software out there, but if there isn't, some entrepreneur needs to develop some word processing app that temporarily "takes over" the computer. While it's active, you can't access the internet or anything stored on your computer. It should be able to monitored by the instructor, who would see that you had been logged into that app and nothing else for the duration of the class period until you turned in your work. I would name it Blue Book. This would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
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@Mary-Anna I have changed how my class grades are weighted to increase the weight of in-class (handwritten) exams.
Also there’s something called a “lockdown browser” that is supposed to do what you describe. It became common during covid but if someone is using it at home, there’s no guarantee that they aren’t using a second device. There also are ones that use the student’s camera and are supposed to ensure that the student’s eyes stay on the device etc. but I never used that because it felt too Orwellian to me. And I haven’t used the lockdown browser for in-class exams yet.
But if students’ handwriting continues to decline, I might have to start!
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Yes, controlling their eyes seems too weird, but separating them from the internet and machine learning software does not!
@Mary-Anna said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
controlling their eyes seems too weird, but separating them from the internet and machine learning software does not!
Indeed. What a world we find ourselves in....
When I took my PhD qualifying exams, we used laptops provided for us by the university tech support office. That way the profs knew exact what was, or was not, included/available on the machines. They couldn't connect to the internet at all, and there would have been no way for an exam taker to "plant" something on the machines.
But at most, you might have five students taking quals in one sitting. Maybe more in a large program, but still a pretty small number.
That's the best scenario, to my mind. The student can use a word processor and edit, structure their text etc. But that would never scale unfortunately.
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I'm getting geared up to start an "I'm retired now" thread, just as soon as I finish grading this last batch of papers, so I no longer have as much skin in the game. (Of course, we all have skin in the game when current events seem poised to make the people who will run the world when we're in our twilight years as ignorant as possible, but I digress.).
Anyway. I have seen some AI work cross my desk, and I've probably been fooled by some, but it's a heavier lift for AI to generate a convincing creative assignment, especially one that convincingly imitates the naivete of a nineteen-year-old's first attempt at fiction. Nevertheless, if I weren't retiring, I would be considering steps like having them do in-class assignments by hand in blue books. They would be miserable to grade, since everybody's handwriting has declined in recent decades, including mine, but they would show that I meant business. I would set the grading scale so that you couldn't pass without writing something in class that was at least plausible.
There may already be software out there, but if there isn't, some entrepreneur needs to develop some word processing app that temporarily "takes over" the computer. While it's active, you can't access the internet or anything stored on your computer. It should be able to monitored by the instructor, who would see that you had been logged into that app and nothing else for the duration of the class period until you turned in your work. I would name it Blue Book. This would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
@Mary-Anna said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
I'm getting geared up to start an "I'm retired now" thread, just as soon as I finish grading this last batch of papers, so I no longer have as much skin in the game. (Of course, we all have skin in the game when current events seem poised to make the people who will run the world when we're in our twilight years as ignorant as possible, but I digress.).
Anyway. I have seen some AI work cross my desk, and I've probably been fooled by some, but it's a heavier lift for AI to generate a convincing creative assignment, especially one that convincingly imitates the naivete of a nineteen-year-old's first attempt at fiction. Nevertheless, if I weren't retiring, I would be considering steps like having them do in-class assignments by hand in blue books. They would be miserable to grade, since everybody's handwriting has declined in recent decades, including mine, but they would show that I meant business. I would set the grading scale so that you couldn't pass without writing something in class that was at least plausible.
There may already be software out there, but if there isn't, some entrepreneur needs to develop some word processing app that temporarily "takes over" the computer. While it's active, you can't access the internet or anything stored on your computer. It should be able to monitored by the instructor, who would see that you had been logged into that app and nothing else for the duration of the class period until you turned in your work. I would name it Blue Book. This would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
Hey, wanna work on something? I'm thinking of writing an essay on how AI is a technological "improvement" that will raise the cost of higher education ... if you want to preserve its quality. I've got a lot of the argument nailed down. I need to dig deeper into the evidence, and I lack your kind of academic perspective.
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I'm getting geared up to start an "I'm retired now" thread, just as soon as I finish grading this last batch of papers, so I no longer have as much skin in the game. (Of course, we all have skin in the game when current events seem poised to make the people who will run the world when we're in our twilight years as ignorant as possible, but I digress.).
Anyway. I have seen some AI work cross my desk, and I've probably been fooled by some, but it's a heavier lift for AI to generate a convincing creative assignment, especially one that convincingly imitates the naivete of a nineteen-year-old's first attempt at fiction. Nevertheless, if I weren't retiring, I would be considering steps like having them do in-class assignments by hand in blue books. They would be miserable to grade, since everybody's handwriting has declined in recent decades, including mine, but they would show that I meant business. I would set the grading scale so that you couldn't pass without writing something in class that was at least plausible.
There may already be software out there, but if there isn't, some entrepreneur needs to develop some word processing app that temporarily "takes over" the computer. While it's active, you can't access the internet or anything stored on your computer. It should be able to monitored by the instructor, who would see that you had been logged into that app and nothing else for the duration of the class period until you turned in your work. I would name it Blue Book. This would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
@Mary-Anna said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
An old fashioned typewriter or work processor at every desk? Seriously - wouldn’t be hard to have something like that set up for student desks in the classroom that was not connected to the internet. We had computer labs in college that we did assignments on.
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@Mary-Anna said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
I'm getting geared up to start an "I'm retired now" thread, just as soon as I finish grading this last batch of papers, so I no longer have as much skin in the game. (Of course, we all have skin in the game when current events seem poised to make the people who will run the world when we're in our twilight years as ignorant as possible, but I digress.).
Anyway. I have seen some AI work cross my desk, and I've probably been fooled by some, but it's a heavier lift for AI to generate a convincing creative assignment, especially one that convincingly imitates the naivete of a nineteen-year-old's first attempt at fiction. Nevertheless, if I weren't retiring, I would be considering steps like having them do in-class assignments by hand in blue books. They would be miserable to grade, since everybody's handwriting has declined in recent decades, including mine, but they would show that I meant business. I would set the grading scale so that you couldn't pass without writing something in class that was at least plausible.
There may already be software out there, but if there isn't, some entrepreneur needs to develop some word processing app that temporarily "takes over" the computer. While it's active, you can't access the internet or anything stored on your computer. It should be able to monitored by the instructor, who would see that you had been logged into that app and nothing else for the duration of the class period until you turned in your work. I would name it Blue Book. This would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
Hey, wanna work on something? I'm thinking of writing an essay on how AI is a technological "improvement" that will raise the cost of higher education ... if you want to preserve its quality. I've got a lot of the argument nailed down. I need to dig deeper into the evidence, and I lack your kind of academic perspective.
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@Mary-Anna said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
An old fashioned typewriter or work processor at every desk? Seriously - wouldn’t be hard to have something like that set up for student desks in the classroom that was not connected to the internet. We had computer labs in college that we did assignments on.
@Jodi said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
@Mary-Anna said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
An old fashioned typewriter or work processor at every desk? Seriously - wouldn’t be hard to have something like that set up for student desks in the classroom that was not connected to the internet. We had computer labs in college that we did assignments on.
I think it may come to that, Jodi.
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@Mary-Anna said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
would allow students to type their work and relieve the poor instructor from the need to read their handwriting.
An old fashioned typewriter or work processor at every desk? Seriously - wouldn’t be hard to have something like that set up for student desks in the classroom that was not connected to the internet. We had computer labs in college that we did assignments on.
@Jodi said in hi chat I need your help writing an essay:
An old fashioned typewriter or work processor at every desk? Seriously - wouldn’t be hard to have something like that set up for student desks in the classroom that was not connected to the internet. We had computer labs in college that we did assignments on.
I wish we had something like this. But logistically, it would be very hard (and expensive and time-consuming) to put it into practice, partly because of the way classrooms have changed and partly because of the scale that would be needed, for example, at state schools like mine that have 40,000 or more students. Especially because we already have a classroom shortage and taking rooms offline to change them would be disruptive.
If there were a reliable way to do it with students' own computers, that would be the easiest way.
Actually, using a lockdown browser, conducting the assessment within the LMS, making everyone sit with their screens facing the proctor.... it might work.... I might try it, this last round of handwritten exams was so horrible, it's its own motivation!
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@Piano-Dad and @Mary-Anna I have lots of thoughts on this subject (both with regard to traditional content courses and with regard to foreign language courses) if you'd like an additional person. (I'm also signed up for a genAI pilot here next AY and prepping a study to do in my language class in the fall regarding using voice AI for language learning)
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Mary Anna and SK, I don't have back channel emails for either of you.
If you're willing, let me write up what I have, which will not be a complete argument. I'll send it to you and then idea-bouncing can commence.
@Piano-Dad
You can find me at maryannaevans at the y-place. -
Scary essay in today's NYTimes about AI.
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Got it. I'm out in the beautiful mountains of Virginia at present. Back home tomorrow. I'll hop on it then.
@Piano-Dad I’ll send you a PM with my email.
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Just think, today's students will be perfectly prepared to work in today's Health and Human Services Department.
