“Contract cheating occurs when a student procures a third party (who knows about and benefits from the transaction) to produce academic work (that is usually, but not always assessable work) that the student then submits to an educational institution as if it were their own” (Ellis, Zucker & Randall (2018) p. 1).  Academic misconduct of any kind is a risk for students.  Use of third–party sites for copying or outsourcing their work will likely be understood as academic misconduct for the most part by students.  Interactions can start out as access to learning resources or tutoring help and become group-sourcing of answers and become outright collusion.  Some sites even reward students for…

“Contract cheating occurs when a student procures a third party (who knows about and benefits from the transaction) to produce academic work (that is usually, but not always assessable work) that the student then submits to an educational institution as if it were their own” (Ellis, Zucker & Randall (2018) p. 1).    There is no silver bullet solution for the problem of contract cheating.  It is multi-faceted, and calls for multiple mitigation strategies.    Assessment design  No assessment is “cheat-proof” but assessment design is widely regarded as an important strategy.  What makes sense or is possible in one course, may not fit for another course.  Instructors considering assessment options can:   Find…