Laura,
          It works.  I had to do this with my MBAs after being summoned
into the dean's office following charges of rampant cheating on an
ethics/law exam using Blackberries, etc.  I pointed out that given the
results, I would hate to have seen what "honest" students would have
scored.  However, I have since gone to open book, note, etc for MBAs.
Capitulate, capitulate, etc.
                              Bruce
At 05:35 PM 9/17/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>I had already started banning electronic dictionaries and now permit
>international students to use only paper ones that I have inspected.
>Now it seems that I need to start banning all electronic devices from
>the exams.  Has anyone out there done this?  Is it as simple as telling
>students to stow them until they leave the exam room?  Any insights or
>advice would be appreciated!
>Laura
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Academy of Legal Studies in Business (ALSB) Talk
>[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Christiansen, Linda A
>Sent: Monday, September 13, 2004 6:45 PM
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: High Tech Cheating
>
>
>Hello everyone,
>If you have not seen the recent articles on high tech cheating in the
>Wall Street Journal, I have included the two articles for your reading
>pleasure.  Apparently students have found all kinds of uses for new
>electronic gadgets.
>
>My students who read the WSJ thought these were great ideas.  Now if I
>could just get them to read the serious business articles...
>
>Linda Christiansen
>
>
>GADGETS
>
>High-Tech Cribbing:
>Camera Phones
>Boost Cheating
>
>By MARLON A. WALKER
>Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
>September 10, 2004; Page B1
>
>Diann Baecker thought it was odd that a student in one of her language
>classes had left his cellphone flipped open during a test -- until she
>started grading the exams.
>
>The assistant professor at Virginia State University in Petersburg
>noticed that the student, and his neighbor, had used identical language
>to answer an essay question. She deduced that one student must have
>taken a picture of his neighbor's essay with his camera-equipped phone
>and then copied the answer onto his own test using the image on the
>phone's screen.
>
>These days, Prof. Baecker tells students to put their phones under their
>desks, along with their books and backpacks. "The picture phone is the
>new thing" for cheating, she says. "Technology just makes it a lot
>easier. They're not leaning over their neighbor's shoulders anymore."
>
>A small but growing number of students are using camera phones to cheat,
>according to students and educators across the country. The techniques
>vary: Camera phones can be used to create high-tech cheat sheets,
>letting students call up photos of key notes they took back in the dorm.
>A student also could surreptitiously send a photo of his answers to a
>friend sitting in the same classroom during an exam.
>
> As millions of students head back to school, camera phones have become
>almost as commonplace as cellphones in colleges, high schools and even
>some middle schools. Camera-phone sales are skyrocketing, from just
>4,000 in the U.S. and Canada at the end of 2002 to an estimated 21.4
>million by the end of this year, according to consulting firm Yankee
>Group in Boston. Camera phones are expected to rise to about half of all
>cellphone sales in the two countries by the end of 2006, Yankee says.
>
>Yet professors and teachers often don't realize the phones can be used
>as a cheating device. And even among instructors who are aware of the
>problem, enforcement is challenging because many students resist parting
>with their phones.
>
>"The average faculty member doesn't understand what their students are
>doing," says Donald McCabe, a Rutgers University professor who helped
>found the Center for Academic Integrity at Duke University in Durham,
>N.C. The center focuses on reducing cheating among students.
>
>Cameras are just the latest way cellphones are being used for cheating.
>Students have become increasingly sophisticated in using their phone
>dial pads to send text messages containing test answers to fellow
>test-takers. In 2003, the University of Maryland failed a group of
>undergraduate business-school students after they were caught engaged in
>the practice.
>
>Yet cameras make cheating even easier. One senior at Elon University in
>Elon, N.C., had worked the night shift at his job and wasn't looking
>forward to several hours of studying for a final exam the next day.
>Instead, he says, he studied for about 30 minutes and then used his
>phone to do the rest -- taking pictures of study-guide problems and
>saving them in his phone.
>
>The student got three extra hours of sleep. And the camera phone helped
>him pass the final, he says.
>
>High schools also are concerned about nefarious uses of cellphones, let
>alone their potential for disrupting classes with constant rings and
>whispered conversations. New York City has a strict no-cellphone policy
>at all public schools. But such a move could be opposed in other
>communities. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, cellphone use
>among high-school and younger students has soared as parents want to be
>able to reach their children. About 45% of U.S. teenagers now have
>cellphones, Yankee Group says.
>
>Banning phones in school "was not a battle that I was going to win,"
>says Jeannette Stern, principal of Wantagh Middle School on New York's
>Long Island. "Parents want to be in touch with their children in this
>day and age." At her school and many others, students can bring phones
>but they must be stored during class hours.
>
>Certainly, most students don't cheat, and some aren't aware that phones
>could abet the practice even if they were so inclined. Tiffany Young, a
>21-year-old senior at Virginia State University, says she thought Ms.
>Baecker's worries were overblown when the instructor launched into a
>nearly 15-minute tirade warning students not to use camera phones to
>cheat.
>
>Yet as schools embrace technology, they may be creating new openings for
>mischief. As more mobile devices like hand-held organizers come with Web
>browsers, and schools equip more classrooms with wireless Internet
>access, students may find themselves able to do Google searches on the
>sly during an exam.
>
>The University of Maryland's graduate business school even plans to give
>BlackBerries to all incoming students. "We know we have just given them
>all the tools to cheat," says Cherie Scricca, associate dean of master
>programs and career management at the school. "We are trying to
>ascertain how the community establishes rules and guidelines for
>itself."
>
>But most schools are trying to fight back. At Case Western University in
>Cleveland, a number of professors are asking students to leave their
>phones in a basket and warning them about the dangers of cheating. The
>punishment for being caught at most schools is severe: expulsion.
>
>"It's the updated version of 'leave your textbooks in the front of the
>classroom.' We had to move and realize there are other items that need
>to be in front of the classroom," says Timothy M. Dodd, Case Western's
>associate dean for undergraduate studies and president-elect of the
>board of the Center for Academic Integrity.
>
>Yet even when caught, some cheaters are undeterred. Last spring, a
>student at Houston Community College used a camera phone to copy another
>student's work for a math class. After reprimanding the student, Prof.
>Linda Rosenkranz went back to her lecture. Not 15 minutes later, the
>student was back at work with her phone in the back of the room. And as
>for that student? "She failed."
>
>
>
>
>September 13, 2004
>
>
>         THE JOURNAL REPORT: TECHNOLOGY
>
>
>
>Putting Tech to the Test
>
>As students turn to high-tech gadgets to cheat, schools consider turning
>to high-tech gadgets to stop them By LAUREN ETTER
>Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
>September 13, 2004; Page R17
>
>Cheating has entered the digital age. Around the world, students have
>stopped hiding crib sheets and whispering to their neighbors -- and
>started swapping test answers by cellphone, camera phone and PDA.
>
>In January 2003, the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of
>Business failed a group of accounting students for using cellphones to
>receive text-message answers during a test. In England last summer,
>proctors caught 254 secondary-school students illicitly using cellphones
>during tests, according to the Assessments and Qualifications Alliance,
>a testing administrator. In June, five students in China were caught
>text-messaging answers for a national college-entrance exam. The
>students face criminal charges of stealing state secrets. Other
>e-cheaters have cropped in Ireland, South Korea, New Zealand and Canada.
>
>Now a handful of tech firms and software developers have begun hawking
>high-tech countermeasures to put the cheaters out of business. The most
>aggressive gadgets block cellphone signals. Others simply sound an alarm
>when a signal is detected, and leave enforcement up to the proctor.
>
>Test Case
>
>Many schools and testing centers are shunning the devices, saying they
>don't want to turn their facilities into high-tech surveillance zones.
>But some high-profile names in education think electronic solutions are
>rapidly becoming a necessity.
>
>Electronic cheating is "definitely a major problem. We deal with it
>every day," says Bud Wood, president of the National College Testing
>Association, a trade group for testing professionals, and manager for
>testing services at Brigham Young University, the largest
>college-testing center in the U.S. "We are trying to find ways to detect
>it. I think we will definitely go ahead with" purchasing cellphone
>detectors.
>
>He says his center is looking at a handheld cellphone-signal detector
>developed by Global Gadget Ltd. of England. The device's manufacturer,
>Zetron, also builds detectors for Cellbusters Mobile Security Products,
>of Phoenix. The devices can pick up radio waves emitted from any
>cellphone or wireless PDA within 90 feet. When the waves are detected,
>the gadget flashes a red light, sounds an alarm or broadcasts a
>prerecorded message asking the cellphone user to turn off the phone.
>
>Safe Haven Technologies Ltd., based in England, has developed a software
>application that would disable the camera function on cellphones. The
>blocking function kicks in whenever the phones pick up a signal from a
>wireless server, which would be installed in schools.
>
>The company says it hasn't found a phone maker to install the software
>in its products, although there are "progressed negotiations with a
>growing number of handset manufacturers and network operators," says
>Patrick Snow, chief executive of Safe Haven.
>
>        CRIMINAL CLASS
>
>
>
>A look at some high-tech cheating methods students use-and the
>countermeasures some teachers have adopted, or are considering
>
>STUDENTS USE...
>
>Text messaging on cellphones to send each others answers during a test
>
>Camera phones to photograph exam questions and send them to a friend
>outside the room. The friend fills in the answers, photographs them and
>sends the picture back.
>
>Internet chat rooms to post exam answers online
>
>TEACHERS CAN USE...
>
>Cellphone detectors, which sound an alarm when they detect wireless
>activity
>
>Cellphone jammer, which blocks all incoming and outgoing signals
>(illegal in the U.S. and Europe)
>
>Quiet Cell, a device that reroutes incoming calls to voice mail and
>prevents outgoing calls (illegal in the U.S. and Europe)
>
>Safe Haven, a software program built into phones that allows their
>camera function to be disabled
>
>
>
>
>
>Cell Block Technologies Inc., based in Fairfax, Va., is currently
>developing Quiet Cell, a device that would automatically reroute
>incoming calls to voice mail and block outgoing calls. "There is a
>tremendous amount of concern in schools -- everything from the bar exam
>to you name it," says J. David Derosier, president and CEO of Cell
>Block. "We have even talked with some schools that have offered to be
>test sites." Mr. Derosier says that from February to May, his company's
>Web site saw a 50% increase in hits from U.S. schools over last year.
>
>But his product faces a big hurdle: It would be illegal in the U.S.
>under Federal Communications Commission regulations, which prohibit
>interfering with licensed telecommunications. Mr. Derosier says he plans
>to launch a grass-roots effort to change the rules, by taking his
>company public and having shareholders work as a lobbying team. For now,
>he says he will also focus on markets outside the U.S.
>
>For some of these tech companies, anti-cheating is a relatively new
>sideline. Their original business was preventing cellphone use in
>prisons, government and military facilities, hospitals and movie
>theaters -- anyplace that had imposed phone-regulation policies.
>
>Cellbusters CEO Derek Forde says he originally thought that the detector
>would be best used in schools to prevent cellphones ringing in class. He
>didn't realize that there was a market for anti-cheating devices until
>he noticed that "converged" cellphones -- which can take pictures, store
>lots of data, send e-mail and surf the Web -- were becoming cheap enough
>for students to afford.
>
>"Students are able to text in their pocket without seeing their phone,"
>says Mr. Forde. "They are able to do it almost blindfolded."
>
>Currently, few schools or testing centers in the U.S. will admit to
>officially using electronic devices to prevent cheating. Mr. Forde says
>educational facilities currently account for about 5% of his sales, but
>adds that many potential customers are testing the device, including a
>large U.S. testing center.
>
>Some schools outside of the U.S. have already put the technology in
>place. At Heathland School in Hounslow, England, Senior Deputy Head
>Nigel Roper uses a Taiwanese cellphone detector.
>
>"Mobile-phone technology is becoming more sophisticated," Mr. Roper
>says, explaining that some children have been caught using cellphones to
>send text messages and photo images of the test answers.
>
>He has found that the detector is best used as a deterrent rather than
>an active alarm. All in all, he considers the detector to be "quite a
>good investment."
>
>Another British school found detectors useless. "We tried it out as an
>experiment, but it wasn't much use to us," says Tony Hacking, deputy
>head of All Hallows High School in Preston, England.
>
>Mr. Hacking complains that the detector, from Global Gadget, isn't
>sophisticated enough to identify the student who is using a device --
>just the general area from where the signal is coming from.
>
>Other potential users express concerns that the detector would be prone
>to false alarms. Moreover, they argue, the process of hunting down an
>offender would be disruptive to honest test takers, and would take so
>long it would allow a student ample time to illicitly access a cellphone
>or PDA.
>
>Michael Menage, CEO of Global Gadget, says the device is used best as a
>deterrent. "It is not designed to track somebody down and hone in on the
>exact desk," he says, adding, "Even the best cellphone detector" can't
>automatically pinpoint a cheater.
>
>Still, he suggests that cheaters are intimidated by the presence of the
>gadget in the test room. If you received an illicit message and a
>proctor was patrolling with a detector, "I think you'd look pretty
>damned guilty," he says.
>
>As far as disruptiveness, he says that the device can be switched to
>vibrate instead of sounding an alarm. But he concedes that it could be
>distracting to have a teacher walking down aisles pointing the device at
>people.
>
>Ultimately, though, Mr. Hacking booted the device because he didn't like
>the reputation it gave his school. It "made our school look as if it was
>the cheat center of the universe."
>
>Many schools share the concern about image. Some parents say cellphone
>detectors, like metal detectors, would make schools come to resemble
>prisons.
>
>Diane Waryold, executive director of the Center for Academic Integrity
>at Duke University in Durham, N.C., thinks the prospect of electronic
>monitoring devices in the classroom is "a little bit troubling." She
>says, "We are trying to create a trusting relationship between faculty
>and students. I don't want to see an arms race with our students."
>
>For the time being, most schools dictate that cellphones must be
>switched off during the day -- and some have banned them outright. But
>bans carry their own image problem. With Columbine and Sept. 11 still
>fresh in their memory, many parents want to keep constant lines of
>communication to their children.
>
>Center of Attention
>
>Since schools have proved tough to crack, Cellbusters is turning its
>attention to large testing centers, which have a hefty financial stake
>in the integrity of examinations. According to Tom Ewing, spokesman for
>Educational Testing Services, a single SAT test takes almost a year to
>create, and costs anywhere between $250,000 and $350,000.
>
>The Law School Admission Council, the official administrator of the Law
>School Admission Test, or LSAT, became intimately aware of the threat in
>1997, when a University of Southern California test taker ran out of the
>exam room with his test book. A proctor chased him, but couldn't stop
>him from hopping into a getaway car.
>
>Hours later, the thief sent the LSAT answers to two test takers at the
>University of Hawaii at Manoa -- where the test was just commencing --
>via electronic pager. The proctor became suspicious when she noticed the
>test takers frequently looking at their pagers. She let them finish
>their exams, then contacted the LSAC, which turned the case over to the
>Los Angeles Police Department.
>
>All three students were prosecuted in California Superior Court on
>charges of conspiracy to commit robbery. They were sentenced to a year
>in jail each and forced to pay $97,000 in restitution to the LSAC.
>
>The LSAC retains experts in electronic surveillance equipment from
>Securitas Security Services USA Inc. to provide staff to administer
>tests, carry out security investigations and alert testing companies of
>the latest cheating gadgetry and trends.
>
>But, for now, it doesn't use electronic detection devices. Jim Vaseleck,
>executive assistant to the president of the LSAC, notes that astute
>proctors, not gadgets, foiled the USC plot -- leading him to believe
>that the detectors are gratuitous.
>
>"We instruct test takers and train proctors that folks are not allowed
>to bring electronic devices into testing centers," he says.
>
>Plus, he believes that low-tech cheating schemes, which can be combated
>only with astute proctors, remain a bigger problem. He notes incidents
>where test takers carved exam answers into No. 2 pencils, selling them
>on the black market for close to $1,000, or lined up different-colored
>M&Ms on a desk to correspond to answers of multiple-choice questions.
>"Electronic devices present more of a nuisance than a security problem,"
>Mr. Vaseleck says.
>
>
>