Phillip Dawson (Deakin U) argues contract cheating is a problem on university patches and warns against too-tough legislation

““The proponents of prohibition fail to demonstrate the effectiveness of their proposed approach or discuss how they plan to address the issues of detection, enforcement, penalties, extraterritoriality, and criminalisation of academic activities,” he argues in a new essay, with Alexander Amigud (CMM May 14).

And he warns that the government’s draft legislation goes too far, potentially empowering higher education regulator TEQSA to pursue friends and family who complete parts of a students’ assignments.  Doing such things is wrong, “but they should not be a crime.”

He has a petition calling for the scope of the proposed legislation to only cover commercial cheating services.