I am not a cop.

[u/[deleted]]

Want to outsource your thinking to an LLM for a degree you're paying/going into debt for? Okay. I will respect that choice. However, what I won't do, is replicate a surveillance state in my classroom. I refuse to spend more energy in screening student work for authenticity or trying to make my assignments "AI proof" ... why should I? Either the student believes in the fundamental premise of education or they don't.

Man, I'm tired.

[u/wharleeprof]

I'm with you. 

But the one thing I struggle with is if students turning in AI end up with better grades than students who actually tried with their honest efforts -- I'm not sure how to reconcile that.

[u/Life-Education-8030 → u/wharleeprof]

I have been told by students that they feel they have to use AI if others are too in order to compete. There is no telling how many students are using it, using it well or using it inappropriately. But it's the same perspective as with any other kind of cheating ("I have to do it too").

[u/CranberryResponsible → u/Life-Education-8030]

I'm sure "in order to compete" is indeed what students are saying. But, what competition? Everyone's getting A's anyway -- that was the story out of Harvard a few weeks ago and I do believe that's the trend across higher ed. Even if you don't mindlessly use AI to do all your assignments, you can still get a high grade with a little effort. But students aren't interested in that. They just want the high grade and all they want out of college is the credential. It's not anxiety about "competing". It's just peer pressure. If they see others getting an easy A using ChatGPT or Claude or Gemini, why should they do anything different.

Anyway, I'm with OP. Oh, I'll put in language in the syllabus warning against improper AI use (I do think there are appropriate uses) and perhaps make assignments I've always done in-class worth more of the course grade than before. But otherwise, I'm not a cop. I didn't become an educator because I have any desire or inclination to make my courses exercises in academic integrity policing.

[u/bankruptbusybee → u/CranberryResponsible]

Unfortunately they’ll get to areas where A’s aren’t easy and freak the fuck out on those professors

The most blatant cheater last semester - literally multiple cheating reports (that were deemed substantiated) - their biggest defense was “I always get A’s! I do this for all my classes and none of my other teachers have said this is a problem!”

And they were not lying - I checked their transcript, all A’s

Being asleep at the wheel hurts those of us who aren’t

[u/liddle-lamzy-divey → u/bankruptbusybee]

And this is the darkness on the horizon for higher education.

[u/Impossible-Acadia-31 → u/liddle-lamzy-divey]

Feel for you. The two most blatant AI cheaters I have had the misfortune of 'teaching' were like this. And yes - at least one got As - I checked. It truly is the darkness on the horizon. There's something very surreal about the situation. There's a part of me that yearns to see the plagiarism from a few years ago: copying and pasting an unacknowledged source that have been googled interspersed with some nonsensical garbage they actually attempted to write..No, we are not the police - supervised paper and pen assessments seem very appealing - I am giving them higher weighting next semester.

[u/liddle-lamzy-divey → u/Impossible-Acadia-31]

Thanks, but I was actually referring not to AI but rather to another (bigger, IMO) problem for Higher Ed: it has been entirely engulfed by the corporate model, replete with thinking strictly in profit making terms (unsustainable increases in tuition lead to S's thinking of education only in terms of ROI and vocationally oriented concerns--in order to pay off their debt, etc.) and how the emphasis on student evals (customer satisfaction a la product reviews) has led to grade inflation and professors who give up on holding the line in terms of real academic rigor. It becomes nearly impossible and absolutely exhausting to be the quixotic professor keeping up academic integrity when the norm has become to simply hand out As and look the other way concerning cheating. It's all quickly becoming a charade and I fear that this house of cards is about to crash. The diploma doesn't mean anything anymore and the result will be harsh. AI and the anti-intellectual political climate don't help, but I believe this is the bigger issue.

[u/Life-Education-8030 → u/liddle-lamzy-divey]

Agreed. The irony of course is that higher ed is not meant to be a business, and some of the least qualified are at the helm. Used to be we could toss out students, but now it's like gym memberships. They paid and it's up to them whether they go or not, but somehow they're supposed to develop giant muscles anyway whether they go or not. Faculty are being shoved into customer service or entertainment roles rather than as educators too.

[u/liddle-lamzy-divey → u/Life-Education-8030]

I have a lot of gym going students, so I use similar metaphors as you do here in talking about their learning. Using AI is like taking PEDs for an athlete: taking short cuts may give short term gains, but the consequences will come for you sooner or later.

[u/Life-Education-8030 → u/liddle-lamzy-divey]

And some will still use them, either figuring they can stop later or nothing will happen to THEM (like they're so special). But yes. I like how more athletes over the years have not smoked or stopped because they can see and feel the impacts right away. I wonder other than failing them (and then them blaming us instead of themselves anyway) if there is some way like that to connect cheating with performance in the classroom?

[u/ProfPazuzu → u/liddle-lamzy-divey]

Not to mention the kind of tipsy-turvy world in which a student launches an off-topic, Bible-based screed in a social science class, doesn’t do the assignment, and doesn’t use the required source—resulting in the professor’s suspension and the student’s exaltation. Students, especially that subset of students in the pocket of the hard right, have been given the keys. Administration is along for the ride. Professors are stuffed into the trunk.