Lukas Coevering | The UvA should embrace artificial intelligence much more
What role should artificial intelligence play at the university? Our brand new student columnist Lukas Coevering writes in his first column about the pioneering role the UvA should take. “Do we want to leave students without experience of something that is rapidly becoming ubiquitous in the modern world?”
Does Artificial Intelligence have a place at an innovative university? The UvA thinks not. Though it markets itself as being forward-thinking, the general policy thus far has been that any AI-written work is plagiarized material. This luddite approach doesn’t solve anything. AI is here to stay, and it will only get better and better at what it does. In fact, it might already be better than us at the university level.
A recent study at the University of Reading showed as much. Researchers created fictional student identities and submitted take-home work for grading that was completely written by Chat-GPT. The result? The submissions written by AI were graded higher on average than students' work, with only 1 out of 33 flagged for being AI-generated. The complete disruption of our way of learning is now a quantified reality rather than a distant possibility.
On the one hand, it makes sense to ban using AI in assignments. After all, cheating is not allowed, and just as stealing another individual's work is cheating, so is using Chat-GPT. Chat-GPT responses are just a novel aggregation of already created content, not written by those submitting the work. On the other hand, none of this matters because AI can and thus will be used by students.
One option is to have all assignments written on pen and paper or even done in person during tutorials. However, it is unclear what this achieves. Never in history has trying to stem the adoption of a technology successfully worked. Even if it did work, once students graduate and pursue careers, they will almost certainly use AI. Do we want to leave students without experience using something that is quickly becoming ubiquitous in the modern world? The answer is no. If university is to prepare us as students to go forth into the world, we need to learn according to how that world works. This means completely rethinking university-level education. If the UvA started taking the lead on this, it could actually be at the forefront of innovative education rather than fighting a doomed battle against AI along with most other universities so far.
The University of Reading, where the aforementioned study on AI's ability to do coursework was published, is already getting a head start. They aim to move away from homework and create assignments that involve students in real-world environments. They will even begin integrating AI into assignments, preparing students for a world in which technological literacy is essential.
The UvA has to change its policy before it becomes an outmoded university. By getting ahead of the curve early, the nature of how AI will be used can be determined in a calculated manner instead of in an inevitable rush to catch up with the rest of the world. After all, at a time when this very article could have itself been written by Chat-GPT, should we continue to consider it a gimmick, or should we start treating it as the revolutionary technology that it is?
Lukas Coevering is a PPLE-student.
