I gave my students a take home exam over spring break. (This is normal where I teach) One of the questions was particulary difficult. It came down to a factor of three in the solution. That factor inexplicably appeared with no justification on many of their exams. I intend to have the students I suspect of cheating come to my office to solve the problem on the board. What would you do?
Edit: I gave them the Tuesday before spring break until the Thursday after. I didn’t want it to be right before or right after.
When I say normal I mean giving take home exams.
You’re only keeping academia in the picture. Academia is worthless for a lot of jobs since you don’t learn anything even remotely relevant in there regarding what you’re going to work as. In that sense, it doesn’t matter at all. A person’s proficiency to learn cannot be judged by them cheating on a small exam/HW. It’s a problem if it’s chronic, but TBH these days most jobs aren’t more than mind-numbing anyway