BRAINMASS.COM Brainmass Brainmass business and ethics Internet, Nationwide

I'm an academic expert with this company and quite frankly, I've had enough.  Admittingly, I'm not that active.  I do just enough to keep my contract, meaning, I answer one or two questions every 60 days to fulfill my contractual obligation.   I never was in it for the money.  I joined because I enjoy helping others and this facilitated my schedule more than an actual teaching job.   I've been a contactor for almost five years and have raised academic integrity issues with this organization in the past.  Experts are evaluated by students who put a high value on Experts actually doing their homework, not assisting them with it. For the most part, I have been able to get decent ratings but this still doesn't negate disgruntled students from impacting an expert's rating if they refuse to play ball and do the student's work.   After several interactions with the staff, I too have come to the conclusion this isn't a reputable organization. 

Students remain anonymous, blatantly submitting homework assignments for completion. Those of us who actually say something aren't really listened too.  While the service does let Experts flag posts from students as possible assignment requests, those same students have the ability to block Experts who don't play ball from flagging their posts as possible assignment requests, thus continuing the cycle of assignment completion for money.  It is my opinion, that after five years of being affiliated with this organization that they do not value academic integrity.  If they did, these students wouldn't be anonymous, they would be forced to enter their school affiliation, and they would be blocked from using the service if academic integrity issues surfaced.

While I was able to help most of the students I encountered in a meaningful way, I was not satisfied by the lack of support and processes to guard against academic integrity issues.  I do agree with 100% with the original poster.  The Brainmass Employee may have tried to discredit this person based on his lack of tenure but I don't have that issue.  I've been with the organization since 2010 and all I see lip service paid to academic integrity and ethical issues.  The concept is great, having students seek online help, but the little nuances such as not having these students identify themselves and their school affiliation helps facilitate students with a lack of integrity.  BrainMass knows this and seems to continue to turn a blind eye to this.

I currently work for brainmass.com and yes, I am aware that there are editors.  I work with them and they appear to be decent folk.  However, the company is shamelessly ripping off those inclined to work for them.  Now no payment is provided until a minimum of 75 dollars is reached...this can take months.  And to top it all the company is s-l-o-w to pay off on scheduled paydays...like today.  As well as the fact, that the writer, not the company must pay for paypal fees.  In essence, you are paying to work for them.

I am not an emloyee of BioMass but I did apply to become an Academic Expert with them. One thing strongly advocated by the company is a strong code of ethics. That includes NOT completing assignments for students. Unfortunately there are many students looking for others to complete their assignments and if the expert does not do that, two things apparently happen. First, the student gives the expert a low rating on the BioMass site. Second, the student files complaints with sites like Rip-Off, as evidenced by some of these reports.

I don't know what the answer is. Those experts who maintain their integrity could get fewer postings in the future. I just got out of clinical practice and can only go by my own experience. There are many patients who go to see the doctor to get better. There is also a select few who will go in order to get their own "drugs of choice." And there are those who do both. So how to weed them out? Experience. Perserverance (driven by a passion that education is inherently valuable). And probably a low-dose of suspicion.

Hi!

My name is Kellie and I'm an editor with Brainmass.com. Didn't know Brainmass had editors? Well, that's because Michael forgot to mention that!

Our team of editors are the front line staff that review and edit all the content developed by Experts. Any time a student asks an Expert for help, the Expert's solution will be included in a database (with over 250,000 entries) for future students to purchase. 

Experts make money off of this too, and many of our responses have hundreds of downloads - meaning a good response can make an Expert 100's of dollars! (Forgot to mention that too Michael!!) BUT, these responses don't go in to the database until we review them - so if we catch an Expert completing students homework without providing appropriate research and guidance, we reject both the response and notify the Brainmass.com management team that our Expert has gone rogue!

That's why Michael was employed with us for only three days...  and no one likes getting caught. 

Hi!

My name is Kellie and I'm an editor with Brainmass.com. Didn't know Brainmass had editors? Well, that's because Michael forgot to mention that!

Our team of editors are the front line staff that review and edit all the content developed by Experts. Any time a student asks an Expert for help, the Expert's solution will be included in a database (with over 250,000 entries) for future students to purchase. 

Experts make money off of this too, and many of our responses have hundreds of downloads - meaning a good response can make an Expert 100's of dollars! (Forgot to mention that too Michael!!) BUT, these responses don't go in to the database until we review them - so if we catch an Expert completing students homework without providing appropriate research and guidance, we reject both the response and notify the Brainmass.com management team that our Expert has gone rogue!

That's why Michael was employed with us for only three days...  and no one likes getting caught. 

BrainMass has been a leader in online tutoring and study help since 2003.  We addressed Michael Weinberg's concerns previously in a reply to an email he sent us when he resigned from BrainMass, but we also wish to respond to the false accusations he has posted here. 

Michael was an Expert (OTA) under contract at BrainMass between February 6th and February 9th, 2012.  Three days!  Michael had a very poor grasp of how BrainMass worked or what our rules and policies are because he did not read the training materials he was required to read, and he challenged how our systems worked right from the moment his account was activated despite our ten years of customer service and his own complete ignorance of what the job was and what it required. 

BrainMass does offer help to students in college.  We bring together students who need homework help that they arent getting from their professors or TAs with graduate students and professionals who are interested in earning some extra cash.  We do require that our Experts provide their credentials to BrainMass to ensure that all of our Experts meet the standards required to join our team.  We do not accept tutors who are not enrolled in or graduates of a Masters degree program.  This ensures that students receive only the best, educated, help from our Experts. 

Michael did not carefully review all aspects of his contract, the training manuals and aids provided by our team, and all the other resources available to him during his 3 days career as an Expert at BrainMass.  Had he spent more time with us he would have learned that the 60/40 split he indicates is actually only 60/40 for the Experts first 10 responses and afterwards, Experts receive 70%.  

This was only one of his several areas of purposeful ignorance. Regarding Michaels complaint about emails: We have a notification system that allows Experts to choose how often they would be notified of new questions.  Experts can choose to have as few as two emails per day notifying them of any new questions added to our site in the last 12 hours. Had he reviewed the materials he was given properly he would have known this.

Michael notes: Brainmass was quite specific that I was to help students with the questions give them the tools they needed to do their work but not to actually do their assigned home work and not to write their essay papers for them.  Later, he says that students would ask for assignments instead.  To clarify, students do not receive completed assignments, tests, exams, or papers from our Experts.  They receive detailed notes, ideas, guidance, research, and all the tools they need to understand the question posed.  For a math question, an explanation of the formula may be involved, for an English question, the historical background of the topic may be needed. 

Students and potential Experts are invited to check some of our samples that are available for free at: http://brainmass.com/content/samples/.  Michael insists that the two questions he addressed were not picked up (paid for) by the students, but this is false.  Both responses were picked up within 48 hours of completion.  Our non-payment policy (http://brainmass.com/content/nonpay_policy.php) covers situations where students do not pick up the responses in an appropriate amount of time.  That did not apply in Michaels case and Michael acknowledges his own untruth in his very next sentence:The second day I received a poor rating of one out of five stars from BOTH students who finally read my posts.  They were certainly paid for by the students because students cannot rate responses that they have not read, and they cannot read responses that they have not paid for.

Students use the rating system to identify any problems or concerns they have.  They can also leave feedback.  When students are not satisfied we require that Experts respond to the complaints.  If the complaint is not valid, our Operations team can remove the rating.  In most cases however, the issue is a misunderstanding, and the student and Expert are able to come to a compromise that ensures the help needed is received.  In Michaels case, no compromise was possible, and so these students were refunded as they had paid for completely unacceptable responses.

Michael claims that we are unethical, but we are happy to point to our almost 10 years in the online tutoring business, as well as the thousands of dollars paid every month to Experts who are hard working, ethical, and caring tutors.  Michael's claims of "assignment completions" most seriously hurts our team of professionals who work hard every day to provide the best help for students every day.

BrainMass is dedicated to helping students with their studies, and provides an excellent source of income for busy graduate students, or a second source of income for graduates and professionals.  We are always happy to address questions or concerns at help@brainmass.com, from both student users, and potential Experts.

Sincerely,
The BrainMass Operations Team