Protecting Academic Integrity: Student Assessment in the Online Environment

Abstract

As state education budgets decease with no corresponding decrease in enrollment, more schools are adding more on-line courses. On-line courses have the advantages of flexible scheduling, greater access for students, and, eventually, when development costs can average out over time, cost effectiveness. A significant disadvantage, however, is that lapses in academic integrity can lead to big problems with cheating, as happened to Florida State University in December 2007. National headlines trumpeted the problems with the academic integrity of an online course when it involved cheating by large numbers of students including more than two dozen FSU football players just before a bowl game.