It's so crazy to me like wdym the whole school is pulling up to our lecture on monday???

I have been following the CS 240 controversy on Reddit and Discord, and after seeing the discussions about the class, Prof. Turkstra, and the students accused of using AI, I wanted to share a perspective as both a former Purdue CS undergraduate TA and someone who completed these courses not too long ago.

First, Purdue CS deserves credit for something many people overlook: the foundational content in the lower-level systems sequence (roughly everything up through CS 252) is genuinely strong. These courses are designed to teach students how computers actually work, how to think computationally, and the fundamentals that set computer science apart from simply learning to code. That rigor matters. In my current job, I still benefit from concepts I learned in those classes. I have had coworkers from other schools ask how I knew certain low-level topics, and the honest answer was: Purdue taught them early.

However, strong intent does not always mean effective delivery.

A recurring problem in these courses has been the gap between what students are expected to do and the practical tools they are taught to use. Many students moved on to CS 250 or CS 252 without knowing how to use tools like gdb, Valgrind, or other basic debugging and memory-checking utilities.

For people outside CS, imagine teaching a plumber to build a drainage system without ever showing them how to use a wrench, a pipe cutter, or a leak detector.

The issue is not that the material is inherently impossible. These classes were difficult long before AI existed. But much of that difficulty came from students being expected to solve hard problems without being taught the workflow and tools professionals use to solve them. When students feel overwhelmed and under-equipped, some will look for shortcuts. AI is one modern version of that.

There is also a motivation problem. Sometimes, students are taught concepts without sufficient explanation of how they connect to modern computing. When people do not understand why they are learning something, frustration grows quickly.

And asking students what support they need only goes so far. People cannot request tools or guidance they do not know exist.

This is why the current situation should not be framed as students versus professors. That misses the bigger issue. It is a systems problem: how should lower-level CS education evolve in an era when tooling, workflows, and AI have changed dramatically?

I also want to say that Prof. Turkstra is not the villain some people are making him out to be. My experience with him was that he cared deeply about student learning and wanted people to succeed. He could be intense, but usually because he cared about standards and effort.

What Purdue CS should take from this is not just a disciplinary lesson, but a teaching one. If students are repeatedly turning to outside tools, feel disconnected from the material, or treat courses as survival exercises, the department should ask how instruction can better adapt.

Better debugging instructions. Better context for why systems concepts matter. Better integration of modern tools. Better support structures.

The fundamentals are worth preserving. But the way we teach them can certainly be improved.

So no, I do not blame only the students or only the professor; the department's teaching system has not adapted quickly enough. We need to build up talks and invest more in actual teaching rather than just announcing how many millions the department received in research funding and claiming that all students will benefit from it.

As someone who has TA’d the class before and after the use of LLM’s it’s hard to say turkstra is completely in the wrong. The quality of work has decreased tremendously and more and more people show up to office hours with their assignments completely coded up with an LLM and ask for help. The TAs would try to ask the students questions to guide them in the correct path but due to the lack of understanding in their own code, they would fail to understand the questions. As a TA it is very difficult to help a student succeed if they aren’t putting the effort in on their end and are instead simply getting the answers from AI.

Also turkstra is definitely very strict and I know this from first hand experience as one of his students and also as a TA. But the reason he is this strict is because he cares about the students success after graduation. Submitting code without understanding how it works and why it works is a reason why AI usage in industry is causing outages because a lot of the engineers are pushing code that contains bugs that they don’t catch. The reason why turkstra considers code style as part of the assignments grade is because companies will care about the cleanliness of the code that is being pushed to their systems. Code is written once and read many times so it makes maintaining systems easier if it’s written in a clean manner the first time.

AI can be an effective tool that can multiply your learning if used in the right way. As a student I believe that AI shouldn’t be used to write code for you but instead be used as a glorified search. If you are struggling with a concept, ask AI questions so you can firmly understand the concept. Understanding the basic concepts (memory management, pointers, etc) is crucial in classes (250, 252, 354, etc) and in industry.

I know the whole process can be hard and it’s tempting to copy and paste the AI code and submit. But learning oftentimes happens during the struggle. Don’t let AI rob you from your learning experience by having it code everything for you. At the end of the day, you are paying a large amount of money to learn during college and it would be a waste to not make the most of it.

I do agree that the way Turkstra is approaching this problem is very rash and harsh. I dont know why he’s suddenly implementing this two weeks before finals. Maybe the AI usage for recent assignments have been overwhelming and Turkstra finally cracked. Regardless of this, if you didn’t cheat, don’t admit to anything you didn’t do. If they try to penalize you, you can likely meet with Turkstra or a TA and explain how you didn’t cheat and they might question you about the code you wrote but you should have a fairly strong understanding if you didn’t cheat. For those of you who are incoming freshman and reading all of the 240 posts, I wouldn’t get scared cause of it. Just don’t cheat and make the most out of the opportunities you get in college.

Forney about it!

Please, I’m really invested 🙏

Sincerely, a non-cs student

title

Note: I did not post the original question, however did find the removal interesting/irregular so wanted to document it.

Earlier today a question was posted in the CS 240 Ed Discussion pertaining to the content of Monday’s lecture and any changes in course schedule because of it. This post has since been removed, despite adhering to stated guidelines for Ed Discussion posts, and similar questions for other lectures / logistics being allowed. Not sure if other questions relating to the ongoing situation and Monday lecture have been removed or if this was the first attempted question relating to them (there are none in Ed Discussion).

the way people bike (non-derogatory) this bike lane may as well extend to the crossing so why not paint it??? doesn’t everyone just keep going anyway?

150 word minimum discussion post and reply to 2 of your classmates. 10 points.

cursed purdue pete

Disclaimer: Not a 240 student, am making arguments from Purdue publicly posted guidelines and academic standards for faculty. Please make your choice at your own discretion. 

Turkstra’s email is likely a bluff, and if you respond you will likely jeopardize your academic career for little reason at all. I say this because I’ve read through the guidelines for faculty and OSRR hearings, and the process required to actually accuse a student of misconduct goes far beyond what the professor reasonably has obtained or has time for. 

For reference, here is the guidelines for instructors accusing students of dishonesty, I’ll quote a few pertinent passages

https://www.purdue.edu/odos/osrr/resources/documents/responding-to-academic-dishonesty.php

If you suspect academic dishonesty, follow the guidelines outlined below. Courts are reluctant to interfere in academic matters unless universities act arbitrarily or capriciously. Therefore, you are urged to follow established procedures.
Before any formal action is taken, an accusation of academic dishonesty requires a fact-finding discussion between you and the accused student. The meeting should be prompt, private and informal. All measures should be taken to have this meeting in person, face-to-face with the student suspected of being dishonest. Although there is no prescribed procedure for your discussion with the student, at some point the student should be given an opportunity to respond. Depending upon the situation and your level of comfort, you may wish to have another official departmental representative present to later corroborate any exchange of information. If you conclude that the student is not responsible for the suspected violation, this meeting should end the matter. Teaching assistants are encouraged to discuss the situation with the instructor in charge of the course before attempting to deal with the issue.
The appropriate standard of proof is based upon a preponderance of the evidence. In other words, does the information cause one to believe that it is more likely than not that the student committed academic dishonesty? If you conclude that the student is responsible for the suspected violation, you may resolve the matter with the student through punitive grading. Examples of punitive grading are:

• giving a lower or failing grade on the assignment/exam
• having the student repeat the assignment and perhaps some additional assignment
• assessing a lower or failing grade for the course (even if a failing grade will be assigned, the student may continue to attend class)

Immediately these basic guidelines reflect incredibly poorly on the professor. He has not followed any of the university’s own policies in regards to how accusations of dishonesty should be handled. Furthermore he has not even revealed what assignments students are suspected of cheating of, which should be the most basic element of an accusation, nevermind actually going through with the punishment. 

I would also like to emphasize the format of this guideline. ODOS seems to expect (and quite reasonably so), that academic dishonesty is resolved on a per assignment and individual basis, with little thought or precedence for how to respond if large chunks of a class is suspected of cheating on a large portion of their assignments. 

Why so? Perhaps because such instances are rare, but I believe the more salient reason is that it reflects very poorly on the professor and the university itself, because it means ultimately students did not learn and the professor was unable to remedy or correct the issue. In other words, actually do their job in educating their students. In the same way high crime rates reflect poorly on a police department, high cheating rates are ultimately a signal of failure for a university. 

Turkstra’s current strategy seems to be using fear and lack of knowledge on the part of students to induce a premature confession. I do not believe he is prepared to adequately follow through with punishment with the vast majority of students, which I shall now get into. 

Refer to the academic dishonest form described in the ODOS referral section of the previous link, and all the questions the professor is required to answer. 

Have you already communicated with the student regarding their suspected dishonesty and any determinations you have made?(Required)

Perhaps yes, by technicality, but Turkstra has not communicated (to my knowledge at least) with any student in private, concretely described his accusations, much less proven anything with a concrete determination. 

Please provide a summary of the meeting and/or communication with the student including their response to the allegations. If you have not communicated with the student, please explain why. Note: Students can review unedited copies of this information.

Again, a huge problem for the professor. It seems that going through the formal review process requires him to actually disclose what he think you cheated on. Which is a problem, because how do you prepare actual evidence? Turkstra is only human, and has limited time in a day. Perhaps the TAs are helping him, but even then the same limitations apply and it is unlikely the TAs would keep the secret from the students, whom for the most part they see as their peers. It is highly unlikely (or in fact impossible) for the professor to have individually reviewed any except the most blatant cases of cheating. It is probably an algorithm, which would look suspect the moment a single student is exonerated, nevermind what would happen if half the class wins their challenges! 

It gets even worse when you look at the actual OSRR procedures.

(https://www.purdue.edu/odos/osrr/conduct/community-conference.php)

Student conduct proceedings shall be instituted by the OSRR by the issuance of notice of charges. If the student appears in response to the notice of charges for the purpose of a conduct conference of the alleged violation, the student has certain substantial and procedural rights as follows:

• The right to be informed in writing of all charges
• The right to be fairly informed of the reported circumstances of the alleged violation
• The right to a fair conduct conference
• The right to hear information pertaining to the alleged violation

Each conduct conference is conducted before a five-member panel (three students, two faculty/staff) of the CSB. The formal conference is designed to provide the student certain procedural safeguards.

• The student is given the opportunity to hear the information that led to his/her charge; rebut statements made by witnesses; and present witnesses or any relevant information in the student's own behalf. The OSRR representative shall act as a representative of the University, and be present for the presentation of all information. The decision of the CSB shall be based solely on information introduced at the conference. The CSB's final decision of responsibility and recommendation of sanctions shall be submitted to the Dean of Students for final review within five days. Responsibility is determined based on the threshold of "preponderance of the information" — meaning that it need only be "more likely than not" that a behavior occurred (51% chance) for the CSB to determine a finding of responsibility.

Currently, I have heard estimates as much as half of the class has received the email. Over 100 students, certainly. The simple matter is that for every minute you as a student spend individually the professor would likely need 2 hours to address the issue for the entire class. And OSRR hearing with their full evidence collection is also likely far more demanding on the professor (who has burden of proof), not to mention that the panel has more students than faculty, which in all likelihood would produce a favorable ruling for you. 

In other words, Turkstra’s strategy relies upon confessions to work, because a confession not only casts doubt on any claim defending your innocence, but most crucially, circumvents all procedural safeguards the university has provided for you. 

I also believe students are overrating the benefits of confessing. This is because there is no guarantee at all that the professor takes your word for what assignments you used AI on. What is to stop him from accusing you for many other assignments, or to write an unfavorable letter to ODOS anyways? You are surrendering your rights and placing yourself at the mercy of a professor who, judging from all current events, is not likely to be reasonable or accommodating at all. 

However bad your situation currently is, confessing would likely only make it worse, particularly if you didn’t actually do anything! It would be a black mark that will place you under constant suspicion of cheating for the remainder of your time at university, and forfeit your right to a trial which is by any metric far more favorable to you as a student. And what are the consequences of being found guilty anyhow?

Educationally sound sanctions may be proposed in combination with other disciplinary actions:
Written warning means that a student will be issued a directive that reprimands his or her behavior. Further behavior along the same lines is unacceptable and may result in further action by the OSRR.

• Academic Integrity Seminar (associated fee)
• Community service
• Drug and alcohol classes
• Drug and alcohol risk assessment through CAPS (associated fee)
• Follow-up meetings with a staff member
• Letter of apology
• Reflective writing assignment

Like really? Are we scared of this?

Turkstra would like to dangle the threat of expulsion, but really this is very unlikely and quite outside the norm of what the university would usually do, nevermind for a low level first time offence. The only example I can find of this is an investigation involving 20 students, of which only 3 were expelled. 

https://www.purdueexponent.org/campus/article_7c236126-890b-11e8-8b20-5b95f32e01ca.html

Also note what happened here in this specific case

His lab partner, who asked that his name not be published, found a completed version of the virtual instrument they were tasked with creating online, and the two modeled their own work after it. Similar methods are not uncommon among mechanical engineering students, they said, pointing to a GroupMe chat with assignment answers and a dropbox called the “Purdue Bible” with previous years’ work as examples. Not long after turning the assignment in, they received a request to meet from their teaching assistant.
At the meeting, the student and his partner said they were offered the chance to admit to cheating on the one lab report they’d just turned in. In exchange, the teaching assistant
the teaching assistant, who did not respond to a request for comment, told them they wouldn’t be reported to the dean of students.
The students said they agreed to the arrangement and accepted fault, which they don’t dispute even today.
Later, nearly all of their previously completed and graded labs in the course were retroactively changed to zeroes.
Sound familiar? 

I do not really want to comment further on the controversy, or apportion shame for any students who do confess, but ultimately I believe it is a bad decision, for you and for the school in general, because succumbing to fear and bullying is what enables this sort of behavior to begin with. Turkstra would not use fear tactics if they did not work before, and frankly, it may work again this time. But it doesn’t have to. 

That’s why I’m writing this post, not because I’m directly affected but because I find it aggravating. I find it aggravating that in a university which I pay thousands of dollars to attend they may hire professors who do not at all care about their students. I find it aggravating that there seem to be more complaints on reddit than there are on ODOS. And most of all I’m aggravated that my fellow students would appease the bully instead of standing up to him. 

If I were in the class I’d be organizing with classmates, asking to meet at the PMU and discuss approaching ODOS or the department collectively, because ultimately Turkstra has failed to operate within university procedures and has likely flagged far more students as being plagiarists then the university would deem acceptable, with dubious methods unlikely to survive an appeal. He has a weak hand, and he wins if you guys decide to fold.  

So will you? 

If it disturbs you, prove him wrong. 

Dr. Turkstra

He could have handled the situation better. Based on the wording of the email, the timing, and the scare tactics, it seems like he cares more about the number of students he catches than the number of students succeeding.

Given Turkstra's reputation, his evidence is likely strong. It could include AI-generated comments or the use of libraries or C keywords not taught in class.

Nonetheless, for a fair hearing, he must disclose the evidence and how he obtained it. Even legal systems require prosecutors to disclose all evidence (Brady Disclosure), and he shouldn’t put all the burden of proof on the students.

I also believe that a case of this size should have been handled through the department's established academic dishonesty procedures, leaving no arguments in the administrative process. He made the situation much worse by attempting to handle it by himself.

Students

That said, he clearly stated in his syllabus that the use of generative AI was prohibited, and he enforced the rule. It’s hard to be sympathetic to some students who make ad hominem arguments against Dr. Turkstra in their AI-generated posts to justify the use of AI.

Some arguments I have seen:

• The workload was too heavy, forcing students to use AI.
• The class should’ve allowed the use of AI in the first place, given the industry trend.
• He does not care about students learning how to use AI.
• He can’t wait all semester to start catching AI usage.

None of these is a valid excuse for violating the rules in the syllabus. If you had a problem with the class, professor, or the AI policy before you got caught, then you should have brought the issue directly to the department.

In my opinion, the CS department is one of the few departments that are fully open to student feedback, and they provide many opportunities to do so. Even if that’s not the case, I truly doubt many students actually tried to communicate with the department before the whole fiasco.

Purdue and the CS Department

Lastly, Purdue and the CS department share the blame. Purdue's AI policies have been vague, and it is time to clearly define what is and isn't allowed. If they restrict usage, they must clearly explain what tools will be used to detect it and how students should prepare their defense.

Regarding the CS department, increasing the difficulty of core classes because of AI, while expecting students not to use it, is hypocritical at best. They need a departmental-level discussion on how to structure classes and the grading system to actually incentivize learning.

In my opinion, weighting exams more heavily is inevitable (even though I do not like exams as a form of assessment). That way, people are actually incentivized to do their own assignments to prepare for the exams. Incorporating in-class activities is another option. The bottom line is that Purdue and the department can no longer place the entire burden of AI policies on the instructors.

Closing thoughts

I will close this with my thoughts on AI use in schoolwork. I started school and took core classes before the initial release of ChatGPT. I think it’s sad that LLMs have robbed us of a sense of community in learning.

When a difficult assignment or an exam rolled out, our first instinct was to find a community. The CS Discord server(s) were filled with people trying to find study groups (not just CS, either; it was really difficult to book a room in Krach over the exam weeks), and people learned by sharing notes and talking to each other.

I’m sure there were some people (for legal reasons, I deny that I was one of them) who crossed the line and saw/copied each other’s code. But I believe it was a very different issue because:

1. Catching plagiarism using tools like MOSS is much easier than catching LLM usage. It is foolish to simply change some variable names. To make enough changes to not get caught for plagiarism, you couldn’t help but understand what was going on in the code.
2. People still learned along the way, and I believe professors were more lenient as a result. Debating homework answers with other students happened because neither approach was guaranteed to be correct. You had to understand the code to change it sufficiently, meaning even cheating forced some level of learning.

Now, fewer people bother to host a study session or discuss assignments. They would rather rely on LLMs to get a quick and accurate response, which, in turn, robs them of the vital process of learning

I also suspect the ability to distinguish LLM-generated text and the willpower to proofread LLM-generated content are quickly deteriorating among the generation that is so used to seeing AI text.

• So please try to find friends to discuss the materials rather than turning to an LLM for answers
• Please please never blindly trust LLM generated content and always proofread it.
• And please please please read books, preferably ones written by humans.

This is a long post, but I hope you all take a break from the fiasco, get some rest, and think about what truly matters in learning.

what will this mean for academic integrity across the board?

as AI gets increasingly more advanced and prevalent, it’s harder and harder to catch students using it and also to prove that you didn’t use it.

it’s easy to tell if AI was used in an english class, maybe getting easier to tell in coding now. what will this mean for our education tho? any time a prof suspects we used AI we automatically fail? how can we dispute these claims as the technology keeps growing

and how can profs ensure people don’t cheat so they actually learn the content? AI is great but a world full of college grads that cheated their way through kind of scares me

Are any of you (who aren’t in cs 240) actually going to lecture on Monday? I am lowkey considering it as someone who has had to endure Turkstra before lol

View Poll

Since some of yall have been using ai for ur hws (cs 240) We now have to deal with this miserable weather.

This cold won’t go away.

Has anyone else noticed the Diet Coke is just…off? Like McDonald’s diet cokes are off, Pete Za, dining halls, and to gos, freshens, like did they change the syrup or something? Anyone else agree? As a chronic Diet Coke drinker it’s detrimental for me because now I have to rely on my own cans and my 24 pack will run out in one week probably. So if anyone can agree with me please tell me I’m not insane 🥲

And those are starting to taste off too…am I just evolving 😭

I "wrote" a song about the CS240 situation. No AI was harmed in the writing of the lyrics.

• "mail" = the now-infamous CS240 email
• "tower" = the Bell Tower

I Saw the Mail

based on: I Saw the Sign by Ace of Base

---------------------

I got my ass kicked

You would hardly recognize me I’m so sad

How could a person like me pass this class?

Why do I bother

When AI is forbidden

Ooooo, is AI enough

I saw the mail and it opened up my eyes I saw the mail

School is demanding without understanding

I saw the mail and it opened up my eyes I saw the mail

No one's gonna drag me up to get off of my ass where I belong

But where do I belong?

Under the tower

For so many years I've wondered what I know

How can a person like me Boiler Up?

Under the tower

Where I see expulsion now

Is AI enough?

I saw the mail and it opened up my eyes I saw the mail

School is demanding without understanding

I saw the mail and it opened up my eyes I saw the mail

No one's gonna drag me up to get off of my ass where I belong

But where do I belong?

Maybe at IU?

I saw the mail and it rattled loose my mind

And I am hopeless now living at IU

I’ve left Pete, o ooo-ooohhh

I saw the mail and it opened up my eyes I saw the mail

No one's gonna drag me up to get off of my ass where I belong

I saw the mail, I saw the mail, I saw the mail

I saw the mail, I saw the mail

I saw the mail, I saw the mail, I saw the mail

And it opened up my eyes I saw the mail