RESPONDING TO THE CHALLENGE OF ACADEMIC INTEGRITY IN DISTANCE LEARNING: USING EXCEL TO GUARANTEE INDIVIDUAL EFFORT

The distance learning environment is highly dependent upon assignment-based assessment. Whereas the business academy may seem well prepared for this transition with the emergence of the case method, a primary objection has been unanswered. Cases generate "canned" solutions that, when passed between students, jeopardize the accountability of individual efforts and the educational value of the exercise. Although students have leveraged computer technology to exacerbate this problem, the professoriate generally has not "fought fire with fire." Through the use of artificial intelligence can restore the confidence that each student will work his/her own case solution and will therefore extract the intended educational purpose from the effort. With computer technology made to act intelligently, assessments given to students should become more robust as a primary pedagogical device of distance learning. One of the least recognized challenges of the distance learning environment pertains to the need to reconfigure student evaluation. This paper describes the problem and proposes a solution based on artificial intelligence concepts that is deliverable within conventional software. The ability to rapidly transfer data and to instantaneously communicate simultaneously makes distance learning possible and threatens its integrity. Much more than with the "face-to-face" learning environment, instructors are heavily dependent upon assignments completed under uncontrolled circumstances. While this packaging of educational material can come closer to addressing the factual richness of the setting, they may be ineffective as measures of student ability. If instructors ignore the prospect that students exchange solutions, individual evaluation is considerably compromised. In this paper, we suggest that computer technology and artificial intelligence can be better brought to bear on the production of case materials so that academic integrity can be maintained. THE NATURE OF THE PROBLEM Concern over the integrity of the solution remains a legitimate concern in the traditional educational environment. Unlike tests, instructors have little control over the actual inputs of individual students when cases are a major part of the course. When cases include expectations that students produce written solutions that are to be graded, individual accountability is at issue. Notwithstanding ethical codes to the contrary, students, in the preparation of their written responses, may "borrow" solutions prepared by other students. This may occur between students in the current year's class, or through more systematic means, between students taking the class in different terms. Fraternities and sororities are notorious in the maintenance of files containing solutions to cases, as well as other materials, in order to reduce the necessary effort of each