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Computer scientist praises efforts to restrict AI use
Stanford University freshmen will take in-class reading quizzes and submit essays using pen and paper to combat artificial intelligence cheating.
The decision from the Civic, Liberal, and Global Education program came after students suggested ways to be judged on their knowledge amidst concerns about AI cheating.
The mandatory courses “will require students to write responses to in-class prompts to ensure that they are not having AI do the work for them,” the Stanford Daily reported. “Similarly, in COLLEGE 101 classes, reading quizzes have been added to the course curriculum.”
The Program in Writing and Rhetoric, a mandatory freshmen course, will also use “in-class writing, on-paper annotations and journaling,” the student newspaper reported.
The College Fix reached out to Jay Hamilton, the vice provost for undergraduate education, and Sara Mrsny, the associate director of the civic education program, for comment on the changes and any pushback. Neither responded to emails and a voicemail left in the past two weeks.
A Stanford computer scientist praised the initiative.
Professor Chris Gregg described an initiative he has taken in his own classes to increase student retention, driven by a decrease in student attendance at office hours: small, three-person sections called “Tutorials.”
“This has been a forcing function to make us have that more individualized attention which I think is great, actually,” he said in a phone interview with The College Fix, referring to the rise of AI.
While Gregg said adjusting classroom policies in response to AI is “certainly a reactionary response,” he noted that, as someone who sits on the Board on Conduct Affairs at Stanford, he has seen rates of cheating go down in recent years.
“I think part of it is because we’ve rethought how we’re doing some of this teaching and some of the assessments,” he said.
The change will help professors avoid an uncomfortable situation with students.
“Catching cheaters is something we hate. Professors hate catching cheaters,” Gregg said. “I mean, really, absolutely, it’s one of the worst things that we do. We’d much rather give authentic assessments, which I think we’re going towards.”
An emeritus professor of English weighed in on cheating concerns.
Professor Mark Bauerlein called artificial intelligence “contrary to a humanistic education,” in an email to The Fix.
Concerns of academic dishonesty are another factor driving changes to the classroom: “The teacher’s first assumption about AI is that everybody cheats—if they can.”
Good learning challenges students, higher ed expert says
The managing editor of a National Association of Scholars publication said Stanford is taking the right steps.
“Stanford is doing about the best a university can do to ensure students actually retain what they’ve learned,” Jared Gould told The College Fix via email. “Students, however, will still have every incentive to use AI anywhere they aren’t being watched.”
Still, other problems exist according to Gould, the managing editor of Minding the Campus.
“We also have to remember that AI doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Grade inflation is still a problem,” Gould wrote in an email to The Fix.
“Whatever we might think of Stanford or other universities bringing back handwritten assignments and in-class exams, these measures won’t do much good if students can still perform poorly on these assessments and be given A’s regardless of their actual academic abilities,” Gould said.
Good learning, Gould said, makes your “brain hurt sometimes.”
“The issue at large is cognitive offloading,” he said. “You simply cannot learn, retain knowledge, and become an educated person without making your brain hurt sometimes.”
He also expressed skepticism that most universities will confront AI’s effect on learning.
“I suspect many universities will happily sell students a credential without spending time determining whether those students can read a difficult book or write a coherent paragraph.”
