Is school cheating inherently a result of systemic limitations? (AI discussion)

[Basman]

With the rise of students using ChatGPT to cheat on their assignments, I've been thinking about the nature of cheating relative to learning as a principle.

I believe that you can't cheat learning on a fundamental level (no?) because cheating is to circumvent the learning process all together. By cheating, you are finding a way of not doing the work required by your tutors while making them think you have, I.E. trick them into thinking you you've done your homework. 

In the real world, if you want to do something you don't know how to do, you have to learn. And there is no "cheating" that learning. You either learn or you don't. There is no one to trick. School, you can cheat because on a fundamental level you are fulfilling the expectations of someone else, an institution, -who's interests you may or may not percieve as being alligned with your own. If you are a dumbass kid, you might feel like school sucks and is boring. Why not cheat?

The issue I'm getting at is that cheating seems to be the result of learning being facilitated by a beurocratic system (school) that only recognizes learning as fulfilling certain criteria. Handing in your assignments and doing standardised tests. Cheating is inherently a result of how the system itself functions. Cheating is essentially a symptom of a flaw within the system. Your being graded on the work you hand in. The fact that you are being "graded" at all. Grades aren't a property of learning but of a system that tries to facilitate it.

What ChatGPT highlights is how our current way of learning is insufficient. The problem is that a lot of our emphasize is on reproducing information. The reproduction of information is increasingly becoming an obsolete with technology. In a sense, I think it is good news that ChatGPT is ruining how schools have been doing things. They are in a sense forced to teach in a way that is more true to the principle of learning, which can't be cheated.

I do appreciate however that it is a challenge to somehow facilitate learning on a national scale for millions of children and adults and somehow make it concistent. I'll give that school is good at teaching you to read and write and add 2+2. I believe a better financial situation for education is a low hanging fruit for improvement.

I'm not particularily knowledgable about the education system but it is something I've been thinking about for years, how it operates currently relative to true learning. It is no joke that we forget the majority of what we "learn" through out school besides the bare basics. It's more a process of socialization more than anything else in my experience. 

What are your thoughts on the matter?

[Mz Hyde]

2 hours ago, Basman said:

Handing in your assignments and doing standardised tests. Cheating is inherently a result of how the system itself functions.

As a graduate student of science of education I couldn't agree more.

2 hours ago, Basman said:

Your being graded on the work you hand in. The fact that you are being "graded" at all. Grades aren't a property of learning but of a system that tries to facilitate it.

What ChatGPT highlights is how our current way of learning is insufficient. The problem is that a lot of our emphasize is on reproducing information.

See this is the thing: what we measure shows what is important to us. The grading system is a very deep problem. Standardized international tests are very important in the neoliberal society we live in today because they demonstrate the "superiority" of countries with the best results. System doesn't give a fuck about what children really know, it just wants to be at the top of the score list.

2 hours ago, Basman said:

What are your thoughts on the matter?

The biggest tragedy is that the structure and organization of the education system is primarily a political, not an educational issue. Such a (non)functioning of the educational system, as we are witnessing today, comes precisely from this disparity of political and educational values.

[Basman]

1 hour ago, Mz Hyde said:

The biggest tragedy is that the structure and organization of the education system is primarily a political, not an educational issue. 

That's interesting. Not something I really have considered before.

[Osaid]

The goal and priority of school is ultimately not learning, but getting a high grade. It's up to the student which one to prioritize. Grades are just a very cheap and lazy way of measuring "learning". The job of learning has been delegated to the grade system.

This motivates an asymmetry between two values: "grades" and "learning". Cheating is something that happens when the value tips towards grades. You can get high grades without learning.

It's a bureaucratic game, and you may or may not learn something along the way of playing this game. Some people cheat. Some people decide to follow all the rules perfectly. Some people decide to do more than the rules ask for since they might feel the rules are limited. It's up to you how you wanna play it, but ultimately it is a very bureaucratic system.
 

[Mz Hyde]

In essence, in order to understand  (and solve) this issue, the education must be viewed as a part of the larger system. We cannot expect education to change while the rest of the system remains the same. That's never gonna fly.

[Basman]

@Osaid What do you think about AI making cheating easier? Doesn't that undermine how the entire system functions?

13 hours ago, Mz Hyde said:

We cannot expect education to change while the rest of the system remains the same. That's never gonna fly.

How so? what exactly needs to change, in your opinion?

[Mz Hyde]

1 hour ago, Basman said:

How so?

It's very complex matter. First of all, you need to understand just how much education is intertwined with so many other parts of the system. There are many determinants that affect education, such as: socio-political organization, degree of scientific and technological development, economic development, level of cultural development, the effect of old traditional patterns that are often very difficult to change, the development of the science of education and other relevant sciences etc.

1 hour ago, Basman said:

what exactly needs to change, in your opinion?

There is no simple and concrete answer to this question. What happens in the school system is only a reflection of what happens in society. Education cannot escape the values of the society of which it is a part. There is no easy and simple solutions here. Systems are hard to change. It's not impossible, but sure is very hard and slow. Real, permanent changes in the system can be made, only if we make an effort to work on all of its aspects.

So, short answer to your question would be - everything.

Edited April 18, 2023 by Mz Hyde

[Osaid]

On 4/18/2023 at 7:10 AM, Basman said:

Doesn't that undermine how the entire system functions?

Yes, but the problem isn't AI. It's a flaw in the system itself that is motivating such behavior. The system was always being undermined, it's just being done more efficiently with AI now, to such a large degree that people are actually forced to seriously consider the issue, whereas before they weren't really talking about it. It's a reality check. If someone is genuinely interested and wants to learn something, they won't cheat. No one who cheats expects to actually learn what they are cheating on. It's fundamentally still about the asymmetry in values I mentioned before.

On the other hand, AI also makes learning easier.

[Basman]

8 hours ago, Osaid said:

Yes, but the problem isn't AI. It's a flaw in the system itself that is motivating such behavior. The system was always being undermined, it's just being done more efficiently with AI now, to such a large degree that people are actually forced to seriously consider the issue, whereas before they weren't really talking about it. It's a reality check. If someone is genuinely interested and wants to learn something, they won't cheat. No one who cheats expects to actually learn what they are cheating on. It's fundamentally still about the asymmetry in values I mentioned before.

On the other hand, AI also makes learning easier.

Well said. That's the basic issue here.

Its always funny to hear and read comments from people who get salty over people cheating not understanding how the system inzentivizes cheating to a certain degree.

[Osaid]

15 hours ago, Basman said:

from people who get salty over people cheating not understanding how the system inzentivizes cheating to a certain degree.

I used to get salty when I cared about following the rules as a kid. Everyone was around me was cheating one way or another, and it irked me because it basically invalidates all your efforts. I was pretty naïve for that. I saw rules as something absolute and unbreakable. And so clinging to that mindset caused a lot of friction in me because it contradicted reality.

95% of those rules are built on fear. Fear is not a very sustainable form of motivation, so it will be broken. People in school are taught rules without them understanding why the rules are made, and in order to do that you use fear and punishment. Like how you prevent a toddler from jumping into a giant puddle because "I said so". The toddler's desire to jump isn't really invalidated, it's just that there is some external authority forcefully blocking the desire now for some unknown reason. 


 

[LittoDitto]

If we're saying,

More advanced school system = Less cheating

than that's fine, but if what is written above is true, that means there will be less people who cheat, and those who do, have to create more advanced strategies to do so, thus making it harder. Would that benefit the cheater in the long run? I would say it's possible. It's how the cheater interprets what they did, and what it means.

Cheater's are not aware of the big picture of what they are doing until after they are done cheating, whether by being caught, or graduating (or ceasing to cheat, I suppose). Even then, the big picture can be kinda murky.

I don't think there is a way to make the system so perfect that no one ever cheats in school.

Is a cheater a part of the system, or separately trying to defeat the system? I would say both.