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Comment by undfg | Hacker News Reader

>We employed the method of mixing the order of questions, not giving question titles, and having a pool of subtly different questions (a negation or a different constant slipped in)

What an awful burden to put on the shoulders of the already overworked and underpaid professors.

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I pay over $6,000 a semester to attend a reasonably-priced state university. While the professors may be overworked and underpaid, from a student perspective, for the money I give the institution, the institution can invest a little in systems that do all this automatically.

International students pay significantly more, and there are often 100 students or more in a class.

So it’s also not a great solution to put the burden of overworked professors onto the students by invading privacy and making them use poorly built suffrage to do so.

The trouble is at the institution level.

I posted this during EU time; I understand they are ripping you off, but your comment does not apply to what I'm saying.

Expensive fees are a thing in countries that observe timezones aligned with "EU time" too.

We did this through the exam software (Browser-Based). Everything not checked automatically (multiple choice) was sorted by question in the backend. We (the examiners) had all the information. It was just hidden from the students.

Glad that you had an automatic system going, but most universities don't have one and can't fund its development, and wanting to shift this burden to professors is unreasonable.

In Germany we have multiple state-sponsored open-source e-learning platforms that basically all support examinations.

Your stance is that it’s unaffordable for a university to spend a small amount of money on randomized browser tests, therefore they should spend a large amount of money on intrusive spying software?

I don't believe a public institution would be able to come up with a system like this that works reasonably and have it developed in a reasonable amount of time within a reasonable budget.

> I don't believe a public institution would be able to come up with a system like this that works reasonably

I don't believe “e-proctoring” companies are capable of it, either. I got disqualified from an exam for five `onblur` events (while my screen was being recorded), and it kept counting while the “DO NOT CHEAT” lockout message was displayed; if that's “works reasonably” then I don't know what isn't.

In 2009 I developed a system like this as part of my course at the equivalent of a community college. The premise of the class was to develop a real world application employing the skills we had learned so far (project management, programming, etc). The whole class (10 people) participated in building this software.

We spent 6 months on it and as far as I heard was still in use as late as 2015.

You don't have to create a whole system; just a database that prepares variants of questions, and a method to put it into the existing exam software.

Your belief is contradicted by reality. For example: https://stack-assessment.org/

> ...and wanting to shift this burden to professors is unreasonable.

Why is it unreasonable? What level of duty do you perceive course instructors having to achieving positive outcomes for their students? Who is responsible for pushing improvements beyond the trough of the status quo?

You are misinformed. Moodle (LMS) and STACK (maths quiz system with symbolic comparison etc.) are open source and fit that description.

Might I ask, was the exam software you used something you acquired from a third-party, or was it something you built yourselves? Would you recommend it? I have been dissatisfied with everything we have tried so far in my organization, and what you used sounds pretty good.

I don’t know what you use for your LMS, but I know Canvas can do most of that as part of its Quiz system (randomize questions given, randomize constants and answers, etc). I’m sure Blackboard and moodle have something similar.

https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I...

https://github.com/ILIAS-eLearning/ILIAS

It's a whole platform for e-learning. The exam system is ... usable. The fine arts, law, and social silences like it very much, because long form answers are readable.

The natural sciences with the math bit have to work around it. We manage.

It could also be a good argument to increase funding for professors and education.

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