Let Your Students Cheat on Exams

Abstract

What if your students could access any resource during a test? How would they react? How would you react? This paper presents some results from a trial of allowing students access to notes, calculators, and any device connected to the internet, which occurred during a midterm in a second-year ordinary differential equations university course. This was generally well-received by the students and feedback informed a subsequent use of this approach in a mathematical reasoning course. I argue that this open-resource exam protocol affords the opportunity for less routine and possibly more conceptual engagement with mathematics.