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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Due-Date-2024 on 2024-10-12 16:36:19+00:00.

I’m a college professor and teach a first year core linguistics unit. Cheating has always been a problem, more so with the advent of AI where some students turn in reference-less ChatGPT word salad.

There are tools that can detect AI written text. It’s not definite, but if a piece of text is assessed as being likely AI written, coupled with a student being unable to defend themselves in an oral viva, then it’s pretty solid evidence. I submitted academic dishonesty reports for several students. I was hoping to spend a hour or so on call in total with those students and ask them questions about their essays.

I got an email back from admin saying that they would not entertain having oral vivas, that AI detectors give false positives so “unless there is an actual AI prompt in their essay we don’t want to hear about it”, and that even if they did cheat “It’s just a sign of adaptability to modern economic forces”.

They finally told me that I should therefore “learn to incorporate AI in my classes”. This happened 12 months ago.

Okay college administration, I will “learn to incorporate AI in my classes”.

I’m the course coordinator for the core unit. I have full control over the syllabus. I started to use an AI proctoring software for all my assessment and quizzes. This software can use facial recognition and tracks keystrokes and copy-pasting.

I also changed the syllabus to have several shorter writing assessments (i.e 400 words) instead of a couple large ones (i.e 1500 words).

Before you dislike me for ruining students’ lives – this is a first year course. Additionally, only citizens can enroll in online degrees in my country, and they only need to start paying back their student loans if they earn more than $52k a year.

The result?

Cheating has been reduced to a nil in my unit. All forms of cheating have been abolished in my class, including paid ghostwriting – AI and human.

I was called to a meeting a few weeks ago where a board told me that data analysis showed that a higher proportion of new students in my major are discontinuing their degree, and that this was forecast to cost them $100,000’s in tuition and CSP funding over the next few years. They told me that they “fear my unconventional assessment method might be to blame.”

I simply stated that I was told to incorporate modern technologies, we are offering an asynchronous online degree, our pathos is to uphold academic honesty, and that I offer flexible AI-driven asynchronous assessment options that are less demanding than having to write large essays.