Little needs to be said about this petition for us UBC students who have been subjected to Proctorio’s monitoring software during recent exams.

Based on a recent history of inappropriate interactions between Proctorio‘s CEO, Mike Olsen, and UBC students and faculty, it is imperative that UBC immediately bans the use of Proctorio in its all classes as a university-wide policy.  Examples include Olsen publishing students' private chat transcripts online and bullying students via Reddit and Twitter before subsequently deleting the relevant posts and making his Twitter profile private.  His Reddit posts are still available as of the time this was posted.

This ban on Proctorio software must come from the President’s office as a mandate to UBC’s teaching staff. Without this level of intervention, professors will inevitably continue using the software out of innocent unawareness, old-school stubbornness, or simple laziness.

Additionally, Proctorio also stands in direct opposition to UBC’s (and President Santa Ono’s) recent efforts to promote student wellbeing, support the many of us with mental health issues, and actively fight against academic practices that produce undue stress and anxiety.  The decision to move to Proctorio was made in haste during the COVID-19 breakout in BC with substantially more concern for exam integrity than students’ mental health.  UBC's teaching staff now has time to develop alternatives, and they must do so before Proctorio (and other online surveillance software) becomes the status quo for another online semester.  Proctorio generates anxiety when good alternatives are available, and UBC must stand with students, not against them.

Ultimately, there are plenty of ways to maintain academic integrity without requiring students to surrender all their privacy to a company that doesn’t respect it.  I believe that our professors are intelligent people who will find creative alternatives if they are required to do so - and several of mine already have.

I chose UBC because it is a world-class teaching and research institution, and I'd expect that same level of quality in our online classes.  Please sign this petition so that this expectation continues into our reality, and we can continue our UBC education without worrying about our privacy due to anxiety-heightening, half-functional, untrustworthy surveillance software.