Since ChatGPT officially rolled out in November 2022, UCA professors have been working to understand what place generative AI has in the classroom for both the teacher and the student.

“We already started having conversations about it. That’s what we do,” said Mike Casey, assistant professor of computer information systems and analytics.

Casey said he was already conducting research projects with AI where “we looked at ChatGPT’s performance against anonymized student results, graded them and then tried to see if we could detect which ones were the student results and which ones were the generative AI results.”

Casey said he also worked with the College of Education to send out surveys about students’ perceptions, uses and ethical positions on generative AI.

Casey said the survey was sent out twice and got 400 results each time.

Following all this research, Casey said he put an AI statement in his syllabus and began to use generative AI in class “to show students what it can be useful for, where the downfalls are and show that we can use it as a tool.”

Other teachers followed suit.

Amy Hawkins, assistant provost of teaching and academic leadership, said she and 30 other faculty took a teaching with AI course offered by Auburn University.

“We were able to — as a learning community — practice, think through what it meant for teaching and learning, and reconsider our assignments,” she said.

Hawkins said that professors held a mini-conference attended by 100 UCA faculty just two weeks ago, where professors discussed topics through the lens of AI, such as ethical implications, teaching applications, and updating syllabus policies.

Before the conference, teachers were given specific guidelines to help them design syllabi with generative AI specifications. 

They were given three options: embrace generative AI use in the classroom, invite the use of generative AI within specified parameters or prohibit generative AI use entirely. 

UCA professors decided to keep the last option but deemed it the least desirable.

“We can’t ignore it,” Hawkins said. 

She said most students “wish I wouldn’t talk about AI because then they can use it without us ever addressing it. Instead, I’m going to come in and tell them exactly when I want them to use it and how I want them to use it.”

Casey, in a similar discussion, said generative AI “is only a problem if we ignore it.” 

Hawkins said she felt that “generative AI is awesome if you’re an expert in something, it is not awesome for a novice to rely on it too soon.”

Casey said, “Generative AI makes experienced programmers better, but novice programmers worse.”

Jen Talbot, associate professor of writing, rhetoric and information design, said she held views similar to Casey and Hawkins’s.

She said, “Students are going to have to understand how and why they can be better than AI.”  Talbot said she is concerned about generative AI’s potential for permitting a student to cheat, damaging their academic integrity.

Talbot said, “The only way ChatGPT is going to prepare you to be able to get and do a job, is if that job can be done by ChatGPT. You’re only cheating yourself.”

Allison Freed, interim assistant chair of the teaching and learning department in the College of Education, said AI is best to “coach our students on how to use it properly and ethically.”

She said, “I have started using it as a requirement for my students to use AI in some of the assignments. It’s a great tool for teachers to become more efficient and productive in their work.”

Freed said she was initially hesitant and apprehensive but concluded, “The ultimate goal of a well-rounded education is for us to teach critical thinking skills.

“AI can be a thought partner and a collaborative tool,” Freed said. “We can use generative AI, as long as we’re also helping our students be critical thinkers around how they’re using it.”