"We did it, Patrick! We made a technological breakthrough!"
A place for all those who loathe AI to discuss things, post articles, and ridicule the AI hype. Proud supporter of working people. And proud booer of SXSW 2024.
AI, in this case, refers to LLMs, GPT technology, and anything listed as "AI" meant to increase market valuations.
Good on him for catching them out, but they should've received more severe a punishment for such blatant and lazy cheating.
And explaining how you caught them doesn't make them less likely to cheat in the future, it simply makes them less likely to be caught doing so.
It's been a good long while, but when I was a student, cheating got you automatically expelled - temporarily for a small "casual" case of plagiarism, permanently for anything more egregious.
I guess things have changed.
Yeah. When I was a student, I got sent to an academic misconduct panel just suspected of cheating, and was told I absolutely could be expelled if they found out I had actually done it.
And sure, in reality somebody had copied my work and I could prove it, so I was fine - but at least they bothered to actually investigate in my example!
I know policies are different between institutions, but these students got caught red-handed not just plagiarising, but outright faking coursework submissions. Why is there no investigation into their previous coursework, no misconduct panel interviews, literally nothing apart from failing the specific part of the mid-term they were caught cheating on.
No wonder they don't give a damn when the punishment for being caught has so little teeth!
As you say, times have changed for the worse.
Colleges have become profit obsessed and students are the cash cows. Expulsion is bad for revenue.
Policy where I teach is that it's up to the professor's discretion, though that's mostly because it's not always as easy to prove as this. There's a boilerplate anti cheating section we have in our syllabus that says it's a reportable offense that may lead to academic probation or expulsion.
Honestly, it's also a ton of paperwork so I've just opted to fail them since usually my papers aren't so easily answered via an LLM and rather than tell them I caught them cheating, I simply point out they missed rubric item 2, 5 and 6 so it's something solid, not my speculation. But I also haven't white texted them yet, lol.
And explaining how you caught them doesn’t make them less likely to cheat in the future, it simply makes them less likely to be caught doing so.
They didn't even read what the AI spewed. They aren't paying attention at all, they're making zero effort. I don't think they'll be less likely to be caught, because they'll never come across the explanation.
32/35?! Cheesus Crackers. The microplastics were already making us stupid, now whatever's left is being melted by corpos.
I think it's supposed to mean 35 people failed, 32 of those because of AI.
That makes a lot more sense. Having almost all your students proven cheaters would be catastrophic, and I can't imagine he would have remained so relatively calm and matter-of-fact.
It's also important to remember that that's 32 college students who didn't proofread. How many more noticed his shenanigans when highlighting the text, or simply used LLMs for only part of their essay?
“Thirty-two of my 35 students between two classes failed a portion of their midterm because they all used AI to generate their entire response,” he explained in a viral TikTok, sounding incredulous. “And apparently they didn’t proofread it.”
In don’t know, that sounds like only three people passed that portion the mid-term.
That professor was more charitable than I would have been, not failing all those students out of the entire class immediately.
Back when I was in university, if you got caught cheating, you got expelled immediately. Now, all you get is possibly a slightly lower score on your midterm?
This is bullshit
I hate how many posts on LinkedIn are “AI is inevitable, we might as well use it everywhere”… um, no. Develop critical thinking and the ability to do it on your own and then, maybe, just maybe, use it as a tool, not a replacement.
Imagine....they didn't. Even. Read it.
They deserve the failure grade
That's why university evaluations should be always in pen and paper.
this is just unacceptable, those students should be just expelled without mercy IMO.
Or at least give students computers that have restricted or no access to the internet? Even before LLMs having access to the internet would have been a huge opportunity to cheat. At least in most subjects.
Also, what happened to teachers/supervisors walking around and checking if the students cheat? Back when I went to school we also cheated with cheat sheets or exchanging answers but it was always risky because getting busted meant failing the test (or worse).
Letting students use the internet unrestrictedly would be like the teacher leaving the room and leaving us unsupervised for the duration of the test back in my days.
Are cheating and plagiarism no longer grounds for immediate expulsion...?
Universities don't teach students out of a sense of duty and honor.
Students are their funding. Failing these 32 students could cost the school millions.
The upper management of high schools are generally the kinda people who'd say "it's not cheating, it's just a tool"
My experience with high school is that they would want you to cheat so the school's numbers look good. The consequences of No Child Left Behind will be felt for a long time.
32 out of 35.
That tracks. I hate over 90% of people
Wow this gen is pathetic. 0 tech literacy
Did a paper with a 20-year old. Intelligent, well-spoken girl. She was absolutely astonished that there are keyboard shortcuts for Cut and Paste.
Good on the three people who wasn't caught, either because the don't use AI or because they at least read the question and the llm output. And gold star if any of them noticed the white text but didn't tell the rest of the students!
Gibson shared some of the most examples in a follow-up video.
The most examply of examples, presumable?
If you're just rehashing someone else's video for your "article" can't you at least check your language?
At least you know it was written by a human 🙂 I honestly welcome dumb spelling and grammar mistakes nowadays - and I never thought I'd ever say that - as a sign that I'm probably not reading slop.
Good. Is there an office on student conduct at the place he worked? Has he reported the students as cheaters already?
You'd have to be really dumb to get caught by this.
People have been using the white font trick in job applications for years now.
Firstly they're students. They haven't done a job application yet - and quite frankly, a lot of them don't know obvious shit because, well, they're young.
But also, a lot of "professionals" who really should know better do stupid shit too.
This is very satisfying!
If they're doing this in other classes then they're either going to get caught and fail or they won't get caught but won't have learned anything. What are these people going to be doing out in the world when they get older?
Our professor did the same thing last year. There was this MIPS assembly tasks and he added extra info there lol
I’d love to have heard the argument from the two students challenging their failing grade for that
Depends on the prompt they gave to build their defense...
It is the next level of laziness to not check what AI generates for you.
I mean, if the AI never explains to them what cheating is, can they even be blamed?
This all sounds like no one is holding the students accountable at all, which means they're not being educated, they're being babysat.
Professors should not be wasting time on gotcha traps for cheats. Mid terms should be hand written on paper.
Man it's so sad to see the state of academia right now. The high water usage and noise pollution affects the entire world, especially in Madagascar.
He should have done a follow-up survey asking the students why they felt it was okay to use LLMs and not proofread their results. This could have been a much greater learning opportunity and also drive home that the point wasn't to shame them.