There is an interesting practical question here. Why cheat?
If you are taking a class voluntarily over the Internet, what benefit would be gained by cheating? I presume that a large fraction of people who are doing volunteer coursework are doing it to learn, not to keep a GPA up for some other reason (sports eligibility, scholarship requirements, parental expectations, Etc.) so looking at other solutions on Github might actually enhance the experience for you if you look at other solutions. If you find a way to do it better than the other solutions that could be a goal in itself.
This is one of those things I find most intriguing about 'free' classes on the Internet, the value equation is shifted around.
It depends on the purpose of your education. In an ideal world, it would be just to learn, but I think employers at some level look at grades/school as a qualification process.
I see where you are coming from but were I interviewing you I would never even think to wonder about a self reported grade in a volunteer class. If the topic was important to the position I'd ask you to talk about it and tell me what you learned. I would hope I could spot you trying to feed me a line.
At the end of the day, as an employer, I am looking for 'learners' not 'cheaters.' If it turns out that an employee's personality/choices lean toward the cheating side I try to manage them out of the organization as smoothly as I can.
Hmm, that is a fair question. I think I would give more weight to a class if they took it when they didn't have to, rather than having taken is a part of a requirement for a degree.
if you are never going to tell future employers, etc that you took the courses, there is no reason to cheat. if you plan on adding these things to your resume, with numbers associated with them, there is definitely an incentive to cheat. most people on the site right now are there to just learn, but coursera is hoping the ladder will eventually happen. it is a catch-22 ... sort of
If you are taking a class voluntarily over the Internet, what benefit would be gained by cheating? I presume that a large fraction of people who are doing volunteer coursework are doing it to learn, not to keep a GPA up for some other reason (sports eligibility, scholarship requirements, parental expectations, Etc.) so looking at other solutions on Github might actually enhance the experience for you if you look at other solutions. If you find a way to do it better than the other solutions that could be a goal in itself.
This is one of those things I find most intriguing about 'free' classes on the Internet, the value equation is shifted around.