This Test Will Self-Destruct In 25 Seconds

A few anti-cheating protections in place at the University of Central Florida, which is going way-high-tech in order to preserve (or re-institute?) its students’ academic integrity, which has taken something of a hit in recent years: “No gum is allowed during an exam: chewing could disguise a student’s speaking into a hands-free cellphone to an accomplice outside.”

The 228 computers that students use are recessed into desk tops so that anyone trying to photograph the screen — using, say, a pen with a hidden camera, in order to help a friend who will take the test later — is easy to spot.

Scratch paper is allowed — but it is stamped with the date and must be turned in later.

When a proctor sees something suspicious, he records the student’s real-time work at the computer and directs an overhead camera to zoom in, and both sets of images are burned onto a CD for evidence.

Pencams! Tiny ear-sized phones! Why has no one made a Mission: Impossible sequel about professors’ attempts to stop cheating? Tom Cruise would certainly be able to chew some scenery!

Of course, there are some people who don’t need high-tech solutions in order to smuggle in notes from the outside world:

As for Central Florida’s testing center, one of its most recent cheating cases had nothing to do with the Internet, cellphones or anything tech. A heavily tattooed student was found with notes written on his arm. He had blended them into his body art.

Do you think the plan, if he was successful, was to get the notes permanently integrated into his ink in order to commemorate the day he fooled the world?

[Via]