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jiqirenyesterday at 9:34 PM2 repliesview on HN

I wasn't at Princeton, but I remember blatant cheating going on and 'study groups' in CS classes that were mere passing around of completed code. (1997-2001)

I'd asked them what they expected would happen when they tried to get jobs or landed one. Like how do you fake work? They just said all jobs are group-based like their study group. (Keep in mind they were soliciting my code as their group was struggling to find solutions to assignments.)

The answer is a one of them works at a grocery store as a cashier, another one I saw now manages a bagel store (didn't know all of them). A waste of time, money, and effort to get a CS degree then just not be able to use it.


Replies

Lucasoatoyesterday at 9:37 PM

Maybe he's happier managing a bagel store rather than dealing with Kubernetes.

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CobrastanJorjiyesterday at 11:41 PM

When I was at Georgia Tech back around 2002, the freshman Java CS course introduced a brand new and improved cheat detector, and they immediately caught over half of the class for cheating. It was disastrous. The penalty for being caught cheating was so onerous that they simply couldn't do it to the whole class.

To the school's credit, they responded as best they could. They considered each case, interviewed the students, and punished them on a sliding scale based on how much cheating, ranging from a zero on that one assignment up to suspension.

Then, for the next semester, they simply changed the rules. You were now officially allowed to cheat all you wanted on homework, but it now only counted for 5% of your grade. That was REALLY bad for people who weren't doing the homework, but it also sucked for people who were just lousy test takers.