Online proctoring: Does anyone even pay attention?

[LevelUP]

The AI thing makes sense.  What I'm guessing is that the live proctors in third-world countries are probalby not very diligent, but that the AI that looks at recorded sessions is probably prety good at detecting people looking away from their screens.

I'm just hoping that the process is reasonably robust.  There's so much rampant cheating (the recent articles about Chegg and CourseHero, for example) that it's really disheartening to consider that some folks "passing" classes may have little or no knowledge about the course they've supposedly passed.

One school gave each of its students all unique questions on an exam for a certain course.  Then when students posted those questions online, they easily found the cheaters based on those unique questions. 

AI can also be used to detect cheating on written assignments by comparing the student's original writing with a ghostwriter with about 90%+ accuracy.

I don't think a lot of schools are using AI to check written assignments yet.  They mainly use plagiarism checker services that scan the internet for duplicate text and assign a score % based on the results.

I'm sure you could create an AI program to write a paper using an individual's unique writing style.  Then you need yet another program invented to catch those cheaters. It's a game of cat and mouse.

In the end, the free market is pretty efficient and if you got the skills, the marketplace will reward you with a higher salary.  Getting the degree is just the checkbox needed to get through the HR firewall.

[FastTrackDegree]

Why would you ever start a thread like this?

[studyingfortests]

Passing an exam does not mean that you know the material, though. Traditionally, students cram before a test and then you retain almost none of that the next day. Conversely, some people are really bad at exams. They know the material but the stress of an exam means that they'd still fail.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution to any of this, even though schools want to stick everyone into the same mold.

That's so true.  I'm pretty decent at exams, but they always make me nervous. I'd much rather write a paper.  But those can't be effectively scored (yet) by machines, which is, I'm sure, why multi-choice exams are so common.

[MrPanda]

At ProctorU, while taking Saylor´s College Algebra, I was given many warnings while trying to solve the exam, since they were saying that I was lowering my head and looking down (I was solving the exercises in the paper), the proctor insisted that I should keep my head up... and I told them that I couldn´t since I had to look at the paper, since I was writing the exercises.

She ended calling her supervisor, and the 2nd lady said that it was okay, and I think they changed the proctor.

[bjcheung77]

Haha, yeah, ProctorU and their staff are a bit funny. I remember asking one of their staff at ProctorU where they were located, it was at the middle of the night. She answered by spelling Alabama wrong. It was pitch dark near me, but in her location, all the windows were bright... she told me the main office is in Alabama, I was asking where she was located! Sometimes there are minor communications errors... I didn't call her out on that but when another Proctor took over, he said they're in Asia, Philippines to be exact. And one other time some staff asked me for two picture ID's and my passport... LOL, I had to scramble to get them after telling him 1 was enough...

[ss20ts]

Haha, yeah, ProctorU and their staff are a bit funny.  I remember asking one of their staff at ProctorU where they were located, it was at the middle of the night.  She answered by spelling Alabama wrong.  It was pitch dark near me, but in her location, all the windows were bright... she told me the main office is in Alabama, I was asking where she was located!  Sometimes there are minor communications errors... I didn't call her out on that but when another Proctor took over, he said they're in Asia, Philippines to be exact.  And one other time some staff asked me for two picture ID's and my passport... LOL, I had to scramble to get them after telling him 1 was enough...

Who has 2 photo ID's? Many people don't have a passport. Aside from a driver's license what else has a photo?

[rachel83az]

There are/were photographic bank/credit cards. But those have always been uncommon. Aside from that, I have no idea. I guess, technically, they want your school ID? A lot of school IDs have photographs, though obviously not all do!

[bjcheung77]

Yeah, it was so weird... I had to ask him a few times and he rejected my claim for the open book exam too. I didn't need the open book, I took a while to get my ID and passport, but when he asked me for the second ID, I told him I didn't have any other... but alas, I found my Costco card and it has the ID picture (even though the quality wasn't great) it worked! The fart head also flagged my exam saying I had "technical issues", a quick call to StraighterLine resolved that...

[jsh1138]

I have taken dozens of them and have never been contacted about anything

[jkoby]

In SDC's case, there *isn't* anyone watching you live at all - the check-in process is entirely automated, and they review the footage after the fact, which is why the final grade takes a few days-weeks to be posted.