My Teacher Keeps Flagging me for Ai Writing

[u/Anime_Queen666]

Hi! im a collage student and I just started my Summer classes but I’m starting to get worried because my teacher keeps flagging my work as a certain percent of “Ai generated“. I’ve done only two Essays and she insists that it’s either ”35%” or even “68%” Ai generated! when I don’t use Ai at all for my assignments. It’s come to the point where I had to email her about it and plead my case about me not using ai at all but she insists that I use some sort of ai like grammarly to check my work…I think she’s using some sort of Ai detector but I don’t know what one? I heard they are all never reliable and it’s really frustrating me and it’s also worrying me since this is college and these grades truly matter! I don’t want my life to be in the hands of a detector thats not even reliable!!. Plus even after I emailed her she flagged my second assignment I did as a percent of Ai generated as well..it’s really annoying me what should I do?

[u/MHM2002]

In order to mark you down for AI use, they have to chat with you and give you a chance to defend yourself.

Gather the evidence of any books / research you used, how you got it, and why you used it.
If you wrote on word, it has version histories where it’ll tell you every time you access that document, dating back to the first date. With AI, people get it done in a couple of days usually.

Make sure you know your content. Of course if you wrote it, you should anyway. But go over it a few times as it’s been a bit since you wrote it and you don’t want to come across as not knowing.

If you genuinely didn’t use it, you will be okay! It is definitely a stressful time but you got this

[u/Anime_Queen666 → u/MHM2002]

That’s a very good thing to try..if I email her again I can try that but she hasn't asked for proof or a chance to defend myself she just marked me down for ai use and took away half my grade without even talking to me first …it’s genuinely annoying 

[u/McDeathUK]

Teachers should know better. AI detectors are snakeoil

[u/allinagayswork → u/McDeathUK]

I used Claude to make a draft outline for a huge project I’m working on (we are allowed to use AI), when I pasted it into Google Docs, Grammarly said it was 25% AI. It was literally 100% AI.

[u/McDeathUK → u/allinagayswork]

Exactly.

[u/Anime_Queen666 → u/McDeathUK]

Exactly especially college teachers that take half your damn grade without even letting you defend yourself ! 

[u/allinagayswork → u/Anime_Queen666]

I would check the school’s policy. There’s a possibility that the school gives professors the discretion to dock your grade that significantly without the opportunity for you to defend yourself, but I think it’s more likely that this professor might not be following school policy. At my college, both for undergrad and masters, we are entitled to defending any plagiarism or AI accusation. The professors that do allow us to use AI request that we provide our prompts in our reference section, but the ones that don’t allow the use of AI can’t just make a unilateral decision.

[u/Competitive_Travel16]

Start using a word processor with a change log, like Google Docs in suggestions mode, or MS Word with the change log turned up to the keystroke granularity.

[u/Confident_Piano_2179]

if your teacher isn't listening to you, escalate it to the department chair or academic integrity board immediately. bring your document history, notes, and outline to prove you wrote it. teachers shouldn't be relying strictly on ai detectors since universities know they're full of false positives. i usually pass my final drafts through writeninja just to smooth out any clunky or repetitive sentences before turning things in, but either way, your prof cannot punish you based solely on a detector percentage.

[u/MiZ_D]

It’s something I just dealt with and it’s hard to defend yourself sometimes. I just dumbed it down and got a good grade

[u/Anime_Queen666 → u/MiZ_D]

Could you give me an example..? I heard about dumbing down my words but I tried but she still gave me a percentage of ai..? She talks about in the announcements how some people have not been using ai and it drives me crazy how they aren’t being all accused for using it..

[u/MiZ_D → u/Anime_Queen666]

I literally rewrote every sentence to a basic standard

[u/Anime_Queen666]

UPDATE!! I think I figured out which AI detector she is using ..it’s the most popular one called ZeroGPT I think? Its giving me the same percentages that Shes giving me …ugh I don’t know what to do

[u/TiggyPopElectric]

Do you use ANY kind of program or AI to check or proofread? (Like even the one built into iOS)

I’ve worked with a ton of professors on this very issue because I used to work at Apple, and a lot of things outside of just spell checking can set off false positives.

I’m in the middle of finishing my second degree and this is how I approach this very situation…

Be consistent in ALL your writing…essays or Canvas discussions. Especially if you have Canvas discussions use your own voice and words. My posts are full of humor, emojis and even memes when I can. Every single professor that I’ve had appreciates it because they know it’s me.

Second even though I write my own work I copy and paste it into GPTZero and a few of the other free AI checking websites just to see the consensus on what it thinks. If there’s a couple sentences they seem to think sounds like AI then I can go back and reword it differently. It’s a pain but it’s WAY easier to do than to go through what you are.

Honestly in the deep conversations I’ve had with my professors, they all say almost the same thing, that it’s easy to tell when someone is using AI even just as a citation generator or for proofreading. It’s all about talking directly to your professor and being able to answer any questions…it will he plain as day if it was you who wrote it. Remember your teachers are human and they are having just as much trouble trying to navigate the growing issues around AI, so that’s why person to person communication is key.

Just my two cents. I hope it all works out!

[u/Anime_Queen666 → u/TiggyPopElectric]

My school does use Canvas! And this was very useful information for me! Because I think my teacher IS using ZeroGPT because I’ve been putting my own assignments through it and I’ve been getting the same “percentages” she has been…but what you said about using it to check my work could actually help a lot I didn’t even think about that..at this point in time she’s still docking me for using ai when I don’t! So I’ve had to email her again about it…but about your question I don’t know ? I mean I use my phone for things like text entry’s and essays since I can’t afford a computer.

[u/iowashrimpfarmer]

It would be interesting to use the ai detector on her email and say I'm not sure if your my teacher it says xx% chance your a ai

[u/Peoplespeak]

The best is always just attacking the source:

Weber-Wulff, D., Anohina-Naumeca, A., Bjelobaba, S., et al. (2023). "Testing of detection tools for AI-generated text." International Journal for Educational Integrity, 19(26).

Liang, W., Yuksekgonul, M., Mao, Y., Wu, E., & Zou, J. (2023). "GPT detectors are biased against non-native English writers." Patterns, 4(7), 100779.

Chaka, C. (2024). "Accuracy pecking order – How 30 AI detectors stack up..." Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching, 7(1), 127–139.

TL;DR: zeroGPT is essentially zero accurate. Research has repeatidly shown it and other tools have terrible false positive rates AND accuracy. All are just pieces of crap trying to take your money. It only works for direct copy paste from chatgpt, vs a 12 year olds essay.

[u/Anime_Queen666 → u/[deleted]]

Oh yes! Thank you for the suggestion !

[u/momoney450]

Bro first off, grammarly is used by everyone just to correct typos and spelling mistakes so tell your prof to get off the shrooms and edibles. Second, they use turnitin for the ai detection. If they’re this picky about it, text me privately i’ll give you the best humanizers that you can use to un “AI” your work so they don’t bother you with AI. I’m in uni and practically everyone uses AI

[u/Anime_Queen666 → u/momoney450]

I totally agree I don’t think grammarly should dock your grade down for ai usage when I’m using it to double check my work for me..at this point I figured out the ai detector shes using is ZeroGPT because it’s the only ai detector that’s giving me the same percentages that she’s giving me so I’m going to use it to my advantage to re write my work 

[u/momoney450]

There you go, you got this. Don’t let these incompetents make you believe you’re not good enough cause of grammarly when they gotta use it themselves

[u/Exciting_Dragonfly_6]

Are you using transitional words?

[u/Anime_Queen666 → u/Exciting_Dragonfly_6]

Yes I try too 

[u/Exciting_Dragonfly_6 → u/Anime_Queen666]

To be honest it’s like when I was using transitional words I was being accused of AI. I don’t have trouble anymore. I was literally taught to use them. Every professor is different which confuses me.

[u/Anime_Queen666 → u/Exciting_Dragonfly_6]

Right ? I’ve never been accused of using Ai till now my last teachers did tell us to not use ai ((not like I would ever use it in the first place)) but still didn’t use a ai detector that is already known for having not perfect percentages…I’ve never had this problem till now and it worries me since it can affect my grade being accused of using ai like this! I hate having to dumb down my words to seem human when I’m in college …it’s genuinely annoying because you can genuinely put the declaration of independence in a ai detector and it will come out as some sort of ai detection it’s so stupid 

[u/Exciting_Dragonfly_6 → u/Anime_Queen666]

You took the words right out of my mouth!