Dean's Brief 3 · Monday, September 21, 2026
When a Student Calls Your Exam Software Spyware
The decision: Every proctored online exam needs a no-software alternative, disclosed before the add deadline. If you cannot offer one, do not require the software.
What is happening
AI finishes most take-home exams in minutes, so faculty are moving to timed, locked-down online tests. Browser extensions that block tabs and watch the screen are the cheap answer. Students are pushing back, and not only the ones who want to cheat. One wrote to her instructor this fall that the proctoring extension was "invasive spyware" with access to her camera, computer, and browsing. She is not wrong about the access, and the courts have started to agree with students: in Ogletree v. Cleveland State University (2022), a federal judge found that a required 360-degree webcam scan of a student's bedroom violated the Fourth Amendment.
The research draws a useful line. In-person proctoring watches the shared room. Remote proctoring watches the student. The second is more invasive by design, which is why consent and alternatives matter.
Three moves
- Disclose before enrollment. If a course requires proctoring software, say so in the catalog note and the first-day syllabus, with the vendor's name and a link to its privacy terms. A student who learns this in week six has a legitimate grievance.
- Always offer a path without the software. An in-person testing center slot, an oral exam, or a proctored session on a campus machine. The cost is small next to one complaint that reaches the president.
- Prefer assessment design to surveillance. A test that AI can finish in minutes is a test of recall. Replace half of it with a local case, a defended trade-off, or an explanation of a worked answer. That is cheaper than proctoring and holds up better.
What to say
To faculty: "Lockdown software is a last resort, disclosed early, with an alternative." To students: "You will never be required to install monitoring software on your own device without another option."
Monday step
Ask the LMS administrator how many courses enabled proctoring extensions this term and whether each syllabus disclosed it. The gap between the two numbers is your exposure.
Sources: AI in Education listserv, Sept. 21–22, 2026; Ogletree v. Cleveland State Univ., N.D. Ohio (2022); Isbell et al. (2023), Language Assessment Quarterly; Coghlan et al. (2021), Philosophy & Technology.