In my in-person sessions with students today (for m hybrid courses), they were telling me about their experience using proctoring software and lockdown browsers for OTHER courses (I could never...). Here are some of the things that they just said casually:
- Several students shared experiences getting locked out of an exam because they were looking away from the screen for too long BECAUSE THEY WERE USING A CALCULATOR. These were students in physics, chemistry, and math classes, and calculators were allowed.
- One student has some construction/renovation going on at their house, and because of the noise, they have to take exams in their unfinished basement. Not because it's distracting: their proctors can't tell if the power tools in the background are helping the student cheat.
- Students are uncomfortable sharing a 360° view of their rooms. Some students mentioned that it's weird because they take their exams in shared living spaces (with roommates, etc.) and it feels weird to invade other people's privacy like that.
- One student doesn't have an isolated place to take their tests, and has gotten flagged multiple times for people in the room, since their family members walk by in the background.
- Two students mentioned privately to me that through the last semester, they weren't able to make it through any of their exams in one of their classes without crying or breaking down in some way.
It's hard to keep my cool here. I don't see how any of this is creating a productive learning experience for students. There's no way you can convince me that students should just get used to these complaints they have.
More and more I realized that I'd rather have a small group of students cheat on my assessments (which they can just re-do) than go hunting and investigating and spying on students, adding stress and anxiety (which only makes it harder for them to show me what they learned).
TL;DR: Cop shit has not place in the classroom. Send tweet.
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