…how do you make that happen?
Leave aside disputes over whether, as teachers, we should allow our students to use AI, or make use of it as a teaching tool, or incorporate into assignments. Suppose, for the sake of this discussion, that we’ve considered all of the pros and cons and have decided it’s best to minimize our students’ use of AI in our courses.
If you don’t want your students using ChatGPT, Claude, DeepSeek, Gemini, Llama, and the like, what do you tell your students, and what do you have them do?
In a recent social media post, Quill Kukla (Georgetown) posted a draft of the course policy they’re working on for this upcoming term (shared with permission):
The use of ChatGPT or any other generative AI to help with style, content, organization, or references is strictly forbidden. Since AI is already built into word programs, I cannot forbid the use of AI for catching typos or grammatical errors. However, any substantive use of AI will result in a nonreplaceable grade of zero for the assignment for the first offense, and a failing grade in the class combined with reporting to the honors council for the second offense. You must do all of your drafting in google docs and keep the version that has your revision history, although your final submissions may be in other forms. If I suspect AI use, I reserve the right ask you to share your google doc.
Kukla adds: “I am also introducing in-class writing assignments and a final exam, both of which I hate doing, but I am keeping the traditional essay.”
That’s one set of options; discussion of it and alternatives are welcome:
If you’re aiming to discourage or prohibit use of AI tools by students,
(A) you should have a course policy (presumably on your syllabus) that explains this, along with a description of the consequences of violating the prohibition; so what’s your policy? How is it enforced? How are violations of it identified?
(B) how, if at all, does this aim affect what kinds of assignments you are giving your students?
I understand that some people may disagree with the aim of discouraging or prohibiting students from using AI on their coursework, but in the interest of keeping the comments here helpful, please leave aside that debate for now.
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