High school teachers warn that an increasing number of students are using artificial intelligence to get ahead in their schoolwork, with some managing to get away with it.
Schools are employing computer programmes to scan essays and reports for evidence of AI use, but teachers say the methods need to be more foolproof.
St. Patrick’s College Wellington head of science Doug Walker noted that misuse of AI has snowballed, and the school now runs an AI detector over all computer-based essays and reports.
With a severe lack of trust, Walker said, “If I gave students free rein, I suspect most of them would use AI.”
Although most AI detection tools do a fairly good job, Walker said that students have become more sophisticated.
In one case, the checking process revealed that a student had instructed ChatGPT to rewrite an essay in the style of a 17-year-old.
A common tell-tale sign was the copying and pasting of large blocks of text.
“They’ve figured out this can be spotted easily, so now they generate the response and physically type it in.”
The students really are thinking smarter, not harder.
