Prompting their way to graduation: The use of AI in academia  

The widespread use of artificial intelligence (AI) has led some students to fully depend on this emerging technology in their academics, using applications such as Open AI and QuillBot to complete most, if not all, of their work.

As AI use for students has become extremely accessible and normalized, many students are already facing the negative of becoming overly dependent on it. 

“I was recently asked if AI had a negative effect on my cognitive skills, and my first instinct was to put this question on ChatGPT, even though the question had to do with my personal experience using AI,” said Ritage Fiazy, a sophomore majoring in Management of Information and Communication Technology (MICT). 

Many departments are starting to integrate AI use in their courses. 

“[Computer science] CS courses are now asking us to use AI in certain assignments. I personally think that the university should frame AI in a friendly way instead of preventing its usage. AI is currently taking over the world, so we should be taught how to use it to our benefit instead of completely relying on it,” Fiazy added. 

Academic Integrity Case Manager Vivian Mitry shared that while AUC will start encouraging the ethical use of AI in courses that permit it, not all departments will be doing this. For example, she mentioned that the Rhetoric and Composition (RHET) department will not permit students to use AI, as their main aim is to lay the foundation and basics of the English language for them. 

While many departments have already embraced the technology while others remained skeptical, one aspect all departments agreed upon is that students can not completely depend on AI for their assignments. 

“While AI use in our major is not prohibited, and it does make our lives easier, it’s not always accurate, and it could harm those who are completely dependent on it by making them not competent enough to compete in the workplace. We use AI to generate codes, but we can’t create an entire project with it,” said Yassin Ahmed, a senior majoring in Electronic and Communications Engineering. 

AUC’s Provost, Ehab Abdel-Rahman, published a statement on the use of AI tools in an attempt to guide students and faculty members on how to use AI tools within the ethical guidelines set by the Office of Academic Integrity. 

“AUC’s Code of Academic Ethics is clear that students and community members must produce original work, cite their sources, and not seek an unfair advantage over others. With any emerging technology, appropriate use and best practices will take time to develop, and the university will continue to share regular updates,” the statement read.

Mitry explained that in the case of unethical use of AI by a student, professors can file a case against the student, who would then have to appear before a committee to determine whether the student is guilty or not. If the student is found guilty of an academic integrity violation, the committee will then decide on a fair punishment for the violation. 

Before appearing in front of the committee, Mitry interviews the student to accurately determine whether the students’ use of language is equivalent to the level of English submitted in their work or not. 

“Almost 50 percent of cheating cases this past semester have been AI-related,” Mitry said.

She added that because they only recently added an AI clause to cheating cases, the Office of Academic Integrity does not have accurate statistics on its usage yet. 

Mitry believes the misuse of AI is hindering students’ abilities to develop cognitive skill sets and will most likely backfire once they start working after college.

“If a student graduates without knowing the basics of how to write a properly structured email, how will they succeed in their work life or their life outside of university?” asked Mitry.

To illustrate how over-dependence on technological tools hinders the brain during its early stages of development, she recounted her own experience as a student. When calculators were introduced at Mitry’s school, she personally found herself unable to calculate any sort of simple equation without a calculator, even though she had previously been able to do math calculations mentally. 

Mitry added that she believes that if students rely on AI to write their papers for them, that is cheating. However, she is not against using AI as a helping hand. If AI usage is accepted in a course, then students can use it “like they use Google, for example,” and cite the part written by it.