Schools and educational institutions in the US and elsewhere are announcing bans on the recently released AI-powered chatbot ChatGPT out of fear that students could use the technology to complete their assignments. However, bans may be practically impossible given how difficult it is to detect when text is composed by ChatGPT. Is it instead time to rethink how students are taught and evaluated?
鈥淓ducators are starting to question what it means to鈥� assess student learning if an AI can write an essay or paper similar to, or even better than, a student would 鈥� and the teacher can鈥檛 tell the difference鈥�, says at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
The ChatGPT AI developed by the company OpenAI displays an uncanny ability to answer conversational prompts and write coherent, if not always factually accurate, text summaries. It attracted 1 million users just days after first going public on 30 November 2022 鈥� and prominent school systems soon began to ban it outright.
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The Los Angeles Unified School District in California, the second largest school district in the US, pre-emptively blocked access to ChatGPT on networks and devices in December 2022. That was followed in January 2023 by a that oversees the largest US school district with more than 1 million students.
Elsewhere in the world, leading Australian universities decided to emphasise and oral presentations in order to thwart students from turning in AI-generated essays.
But removing technology from the classroom can mean undesirable consequences such as creating more obstacles for students with disabilities, says Trust. Furthermore, restricting access to ChatGPT on school networks and devices won鈥檛 stop students from using the chatbot at home and in libraries.
It is also unclear if anti-cheating software can reliably detect AI-assisted writing. OpenAI is working to develop a digital watermark that can help teachers and academics spot students who are using ChatGPT to write essays.
鈥淐hatGPT provides a tempting opportunity for students to exhibit their technological prowess as well as attempt to gain advantage on their professors in the cheating 鈥榓rms race鈥�,鈥� says at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. 鈥淏locking the program on university campuses will be nearly impossible, and similar systems are already emerging.鈥�
Instead of worrying about how ChatGPT could enable cheating, educators should ask what motivates students to cheat in the first place and work on developing relationships of trust, says at the University of Denver in Colorado.
鈥淭alk to students really frankly about what ChatGPT鈥檚 capable of, what it鈥檚 not capable of,鈥� says Stommel. 鈥淗ave students use it to write an essay about Jane Austen and gender dynamics, and then have them read that essay and peer review it and think about what ChatGPT gets right and wrong.鈥�
School bans also overlook the possibilities for how ChatGPT could help teachers with time-consuming tasks, says at the University of California, Berkeley. He has explored using the AI to help create lesson plans, write letters of recommendation and develop and even grade assignments. He recently held a ChatGPT workshop for teachers in India.
鈥淥ur ultimate goal is to help learners,鈥� says Chowkase. 鈥淪o by upgrading ourselves as teachers, by embracing these newer technologies, we can do that.鈥�
Similarly, Trust has publicly shared a slide deck intended to help teachers understand some of the promise and pitfalls of using . She hopes that more schools eventually shift away from just trying to 鈥減olice and control鈥� student use of technologies such as ChatGPT.
鈥淚 just wish educators could see that AI writing tools are going to be part of our future 鈥� and a big part of students鈥� future careers,鈥� says Trust.
