Three teaching things: week of February 7
In this issue: research on why students cheat; a post on why Chegg might be worse that you think (and has no easy solution); and a tool to create networked notes.
Issue #36
1. The paper
In their own words: a qualitative study of the reasons Australian university students plagiarize.
Academic integrity has emerged as a hot topic at my institution over our Winter semester. And while I don’t find myself in Australia, this 2007 paper does offer insight into the reasons why a student would diverge from academic integrity. As we consider our current situation, it’s important for us not assume what the underlying conditions are that drive the behaviour. This paper suggests 8 reasons for plagiarism, and pp. 187-192 details just what each category means:
Inadequate admission criteria.
Poor understanding of plagiarism.
Poor academic skills.
Teaching/learning issues.
Laziness/convenience.
Pride in plagiarizing.
Pressures.
Education costs
Getting on my soapbox, helping ensure the integrity of our courses and programs will entail developing solutions that consider (and address) the variety of categories that inform a student’s decision to deviate from academic integrity. Focusing on solving only one category (and bonus research finding time, this paper suggests [on p. 55] that the use of a technological solution does not necessarily deter plagiarism) will increase the likelihood of that approach’s failure.
The unanswered question from the Devlin & Gray paper is if/how the context of a remote learning environment, such as the one we now find ourselves in, would change these categories.
Devlin, M., & Gray, K. (2007). In their own words: a qualitative study of the reasons Australian university students plagiarize. Higher Education Research & Development, 26(2), 181–198. https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360701310805
2. The resource
The Chegg Situation is Worse Than You Think
This recent post on the eLiterate website certainly brings our current remote teaching context into focus: students are using third-party “homework help” sites like Chegg, or Course Hero, to post and receive help on course questions. Seems like this is extending beyond help with homework, and expands into more summative evaluations.
And this is challenging some taken-for-granted approaches to assessment, because what good is a test bank if all the questions (and answers) have been posted online? Let me suggest that this is wholly disruptive, no matter how quickly we return to mostly in-person teaching, and marks a stroke of death for the so-called disposable assignment.
But, as the headline suggests, the situation does seem a whole lot worse. I’ve already teased what I read as the bombshell of this article: textbook publishers have sold homework question banks to Chegg. If true: WTF?
So…what to do? My colleagues and I are working (partly) under the assumption that the wholesale change in the mode of instruction means that students could be operating under the “poor understanding of plagiarism” category described by Devlin & Gray (2007)—that access to digital questions and course material has opened up a different way to deviate from academic integrity than typical. Part of a solution then would be education: for the student (around, say, intellectual property, and appropriate use and reuse of these materials), and for the instructor (on, say, assignment design).
But this closing paragraph points to something larger:
If you listen to the whole of the Rosensweig interview quoted in that Forbes article, you’ll hear a guy who is not an educator. He’s a businessman who wanted to make money solving some problem related to education. And yes, he wanted to feel like he was helping students in the process. We can scoff at that all we want, but the fact is that students go to Chegg seeking help. They pay for that help, which they believe they need and are not getting from their academic institution. We can choose to be cynical about the companies, and even about the students. Or we can improve academic practices and challenge Mr. Rosensweig to make his money by providing services that actually help students to learn.
Chegg has (and perhaps inadvertently) has weaponized institutional gaps in student learning supports.
Now…what to do about that?
Hint: the answer isn’t an institutional subscription to plagiarism detection software (that link featured in November 22nd’s issue).
3. The tool
Roam
This tool helps you create networked notes.
While it’s a tool not directly designed to solve a teaching and learning challenge, it can be used to support your practices. Here’s a a post that provides a summary on how to use the tool, and the video below provides an overview.
Three Teaching Things is a weekly newsletter compiled by Gavan Watson, which shares three different teaching and learning resources (papers, resources or tools) worth your attention.
Thanks for reading!
Hi Gavan, I just wanted to re-iterate how much I appreciate your weekly Three Teaching Things! Thanks for making such an informative, practical, and succinct newsletter!