Did Dartmouth College secretly track students' devices? Medical school charges 17 with cheating in remote exams
HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE: A prestigious Ivy League college, Dartmouth College, has alleged that 17 of its students cheated during remote examinations amid the Covid-19 pandemic after tracking their online activity without letting them know. According to reports, to do an inspection of students' electronic devices, the college took the help of the Canvas learning management system. The audit was reportedly done after a faculty member complained of possible cheating.
The software is not new for the Ivy League colleges, since Princeton, Harvard, and Yale also use it. After the students were accused by the school of cheating, they blamed the institution for carrying out inappropriate school surveillance during the public health crisis. They also alleged that the Canvas learning management system is not a hundred percent reliable as it is likely to fail or make errors.
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After the backlash, the college dropped charges against seven of the 17 students but some of the other accused students alleged that the College's Geisel School of Medicine pressured them to plead guilty and ask for leniency in punishment. Among the ten students who are still accused of cheating, some face expulsion, some face suspension, while some may have to repeat the year, at a cost of $79,000 for tuition and board.
One of the accused students is Sirey Zhang, a first-year student at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine, who was on spring break in March when he got an email that alleged that he cheated on remote exams as in-person tests were banned because of the pandemic. “What has happened to me in the last month, despite not cheating, has resulted in one of the most terrifying, isolating experiences of my life,” the 22-year-old, who has filed an appeal and is also facing suspension, told The New York Times.
Cooper Quntin, a senior staff technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, stated, “If other schools follow the precedent that Dartmouth is setting here, any student can be accused based on the flimsiest technical evidence.” Another cybersecurity expert named Shaanan Cohney -- a cybersecurity lecturer at the University of Melbourne who researches remote learning software -- said: “These kinds of technical solutions to academic misconduct seem like a magic bullet.” But Cohney added that “universities which lack some of the structure or the expertise to understand these issues on a deeper level end up running into really significant trouble.”
Besides, over 100 students have written a letter to the College alleging that it executed a “flawed” probe endangering their future. “Students felt that they were choosing between admitting guilt and their future as a physician. Confused and vulnerable, many students accepted the advice from Student Affairs leadership and apologized for the alleged infractions. These are not valid admissions of guilt and should be disregarded. As a result of this investigation, many accused students shared their experiences of suicidal ideation, panic attacks, and inability to eat or sleep through the now-deleted Instagram account, @concernedstudent1797,” the letter, which was acquired by Daily Mail, added.
The dean of the Geisel School, Duane A Compton, has defended the use of the software for the audit. Compton said, “We take academic integrity very seriously. We wouldn’t want people to be able to be eligible for a medical license without really having the appropriate training.”
