Professor Denounces Mass AI Fraud on an Exam at Brown University

Roberto Serrano, the Harrison S. Kravis University Professor of Economics at Brown University, says he has conclusive evidence that at least 50 students cheated on the March midterm of ECON 1170, an advanced undergraduate course in mathematical economics. He told El País it is the largest known cheating case in the Ivy League.

A silent response from the administration

When Serrano reported the case to senior officials, the reaction was muted. The provost, he says, did not respond at all, and the dean stayed silent until the professor took the matter to the Academic Code Committee; only then did he receive a note acknowledging that what had happened in his classroom was “a wake-up call.” He does not consider that enough. “That cannot be the university's position before an incident of this magnitude. Academic integrity is a value worth defending,” he told the paper, adding that faculty cannot be left alone in a fight decisive for the future of higher education.

What the exam results showed

The course normally attracts very few, very good students — never more than 30; this semester 86 enrolled, which he attributes to the new format: both exams were take-home and closed-book. The March 5 midterm produced an average of 96 out of 100, with 40 students at a perfect 100, and the graders warned him about passages that matched answers produced with ChatGPT.

Serrano did not void the midterm, warning students instead that the final, worth 50% of the grade, would be in person and the only one counted if the distribution did not resemble the midterm's. The average fell to 48 out of 100. Of the 89 students who took the midterm, 59 sat the final — and 22 of the 27 who did not show up had scored a perfect 100 in March. “The empirical evidence of fraud is overwhelming,” he says. From the coming academic year, weekly exercises will no longer count and there will be no more take-home exams.

December, donations and a wider shift

Serrano, 61, was born in Madrid and has taught at Brown for 34 years. He chose the take-home format partly out of concern for students after the December 13 shooting on campus, when a 48-year-old former doctoral student opened fire, killing two and injuring nine; two of the injured were in his class. He also worries that the university may side with students because it receives generous donations from wealthy families: “the kids always get the benefit of the doubt.”

Brown is not alone. Princeton has decided to end a practice maintained for 133 years: professors will proctor in-person exams, a practice unchanged since an 1893 honor code let instructors hand out papers and leave the room. In The New York Times, the journalist Theo Baker argued that “A.I. has made deception easier and more remunerative than ever before.” Serrano agrees the incentive to cheat has grown and argues these cases cannot be swept under the rug. “If we no longer defend truth and decency and honesty, then what kind of credibility are we going to have as academics?”