The Ethics of Evaluating Instructional Computing - Considerations of These Analyses - The Research Center on Computing & Society

Text-only Version

Marvin J. Croy

3. Considerations of These Analyses

In providing their analyses, Moor and Overall make a number of recommendations. Some of these are directed to the particular hypothetical case described and specify how the instructor caught in this mid-semester predicament should respond. Other recommendations move beyond this question and address general issues of evaluating CAI. These are the main concern here and it is clear that this hypothetical case highlights ethical issues involved in instituting and assessing educational innovations in general. In one important respect, however, the case analyzed is not representative of controlled evaluations of CAI nor of assessments of educational innovation in general. In the hypothetical case, the superiority of the experimental treatment is presented as a given. In actual cases of evaluating CAI, the superiority of CAI over traditional methods is in doubt. Indeed, many empirical studies attempting to demonstrate that superiority have failed to do so. Consequently, the efficacy of these programs should not be assumed when discussing the ways in which students may be deprived or harmed by controlled evaluations of CAI. It is not clear to what extent this assumption underlies either Moor’s or Overall’s conclusion about CAI evaluation in general. Moor’s parenthetical qualification does seem crucial since his resolution is designed to address the “inherent injustice [which] occurs when an instructor arbitrarily divides a class so that (as the instructor may have good reasons to believe) one half receives substantially more educational assistance than the other half even though both halves receive at least a normal amount of instruction.”(12) This raises the question of whether Moor’s resolution would be required if the instructor did not have good reason to believe that the control group was being disadvantaged. A similar question can be raised about Overall’s recommendation to compare courses before and after the introduction of CAI, if it is based on the assumption that students are automatically making sacrifices, being harmed, or being deprived when assigned to control groups. In any event, the issue to be addressed here concerns the responsibilities and rights of instructors and students in the course of evaluating techniques the effectiveness of which is genuinely in doubt.

This issue is important because students have a right to effective instruction and they should not be forcefully grouped in ways that preclude members of different groups from receiving equally effective instruction. The concept of equally effective instruction underlies the appeal to equal educational opportunities in this context and has an important relationship to the instructor’s responsibility for providing optimum instruction. In order to elaborate this point, further consideration will be given to the instructor’s responsibility for (1) ensuring equal educational opportunities, (2) providing optimum instruction, and (3) respecting the requirement of informed consent.

Back to the top

Go to: 3.1 Equal Educational Opportunity

Home > Teaching Resources > Computer Ethics Issues in Academic Computing > The Ethics of Evaluating Instructional Computing

The Research Center on Computing & Society
at Southern Connecticut State University
501 Crescent Street • New Haven, CT 06515
Director: (203) 392-6790 • e-mail: webmaster@computerethics.org

© 2000 – 2007 – Research Center on Computing & Society