Most of my engineering higher level classes were open everything not electronic. If you don't know how to tackle the problem, you're not going to finish on time.
I remember some math classes that did it well: send students home with original assignments to do proofs. I guess it's theoretically open to having someone else do the assignment, but so are lots of other things. Because I could just sit and attack the problems like problems, without massive time pressure and my every action monitored, I enjoyed those assignments and exams.
Similarly, in CS classes, I always enjoyed assignments where I got to go write a program to do something. Again, it could be cheated, but so could lots of other things.
The fact that some students cheat shouldn't ruin classes for everyone else. Since cheaters do lower the value of a degree, maybe universities should start taking legal action against them instead. Provide a huge disincentive without messing everything up for the majority of students.
“Original assignments” as in everybody has a different assignment? If so, dang that sounds like a huge time investment to create and grade for the prof and TAs.
WRT legal consequences for cheating: I mean, you can get kicked out of university. That’s a loss of thousands of dollars invested. And as a TA, if I knew I could be called in to testify in court every time I caught a student cheating... I’d never call it out. I don’t have time for that! And that still wouldn’t change that we’d have to be on the lookout for cheating.
Most of my engineering higher level classes were open everything not electronic. If you don't know how to tackle the problem, you're not going to finish on time.