Sarah Eaton, a professor at the University of Calgary, said she has seen increases in cheating from about 40 per cent to over 200 per cent, based on reports published by schools across the country. But, online learning isn’t to blame, she said, having long researched academic misconduct in Canadian post-secondary institutions. “There was about 20 years of research before the pandemic that showed that there was less academic misconduct in online courses compared to face-to-face learning.” Rather, she said, it’s the fact that students were “forced into online learning when they didn’t want to be,” coupled with teachers who are inexperienced and “not well trained in how to deliver their classes in online learning.”
