Distribution of Textbook Solutions Among Students
Devising new homework problems or test questions is time consuming and often professors resort to reusing questions and assigning problems from textbooks. The reuse of problems and reliance on textbook problems may result in students having access to the answers. On-line sites such as cramster.com cater to student demand for textbook solutions. Dr. Kara Kockelman in CAEE contacted the FIC to see how other faculty are dealing with the dilemma of student distribution of homework solutions. She noticed that a couple of students did really well on homeworks, but poorly on the first exam. She asked them about it and they revealed that they had come upon the solutions (one had bought them online and the other had accidentally purchased the instructor’s version of the text that had the solutions manual included).
Wanting to know more, Kara surveyed her sophomore-level probability and statistics class (CE311S) and 37 out of the 41 responded. Overall the students said they like to have solutions because it saves them time and they believe they are learning better and faster. Recognizing that many students have access to the answers (students reported suspected some solutions availability in 50% of their science and engineering classes and had access themselves in 28% of such courses), they recommend that she (as well as other instructors) reduce the weight given to homework. It appears that such solutions generally are available electronically, and only 8 of the 37 students had seen solutions from prior students in the class. The students indicated that mostly B students have the answers, but a fair number of A students may as well. They identified time constraints and a desire to see an entire solution before the instructor provides it as the major motivators for seeking out solutions.
There are numerous ways to address this issue, but it highly unlikely it can be eradicated. Kara suggested checking what solution sets exist online to see if solutions manuals are readily available and to alert publishers. (In her case, for example, fully worked-out solutions to all odd-numbered book problems can be purchased by anyone. Trying to sell the instructor’s version of all solutions, however, should result in a cease and desist order by the publisher, who retains that copyright.) She also suggested course-specific honor codes, to reinforce the need for a level playing field among students. Tim Dodd, Director of the Center for Academic Integrity (http://www.academicintegrity.org/), offers these approaches:
Bottom line is we need to remind students of their obligation to perform honest scholarship and that there are penalties for using unauthorized materials. Publishers must also work to directly address this dilemma. For example, Wiley no longer sends a CD with solutions, but rather provides special logins to professors who can only access a certain number of solutions at a time. Maintaining academic security not only helps our students learn, but it also promotes a more collegial environment.
If you are interested in seeing and possibly using the survey Kara used, and/or seeing a spreadsheet of tallied responses, please write Kathy Schmidt (k.schmidt@mail.utexas.edu) or Kara Kockelman (kkockelm@mail.utexas.edu). Let us know what you come up with, and what you recommend!