“ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE” (AI) – CHALLENGES AND POTENTIAL FOR HIGHER EDUCATION
About a month ago I attended a professional development session focusing on Artificial Intelligence which was hosted by Senior VP for Student Affairs, Dr. Steven Sears. The presentation was delivered by Dr. Christine Earley, a professor of accountancy, who also serves as the Associate Provost for Faculty Development and the Chair of the Providence College Artificial Intelligence Committee. As Christine shared her knowledge, I can tell you that as a teacher and administrator, the more I wanted to know about emerging AI technologies and their impact on higher education from admissions, to teaching, and well beyond the classroom.
In my role, I am always looking for ways to help parents and families look at the bigger picture in higher education and its impact on both students and the College. So, I was especially pleased when Dr. Earley agreed to address some questions on AI for all of you. Feel free to share this information with your students, as well. If you have questions about AI and how we are preparing for the future please contact Dr. Christine Earley at cearley@providence.edu .
Jackie
What is generative AI and why is it getting so much attention now?
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been built into the devices we use and software programs we use every day (think of Amazon Alexa, Siri, or the grammar, editing, and design features in Microsoft Word or PowerPoint). However, on November 30, 2022, OpenAI introduced ChatGPT and made it available for free, resulting in the fastest adoption of a technology tool on record. Chat GPT is capable of generating ideas, solving problems and writing complex text. We can ask ChatGPT to write a document by just using words to describe what we want the document to contain. The request that is fed into the generative AI tool is known as a “prompt” and the skill of prompt engineering is fast becoming an important career skill.
There are many AI-enabled programs in addition to Chat GPT that can perform other functions, such as creating works of art, using one’s voice or image to create visual or spoken content that is undistinguishable from the original person, etc. This use (or misuse) of AI is at the heart of the Writer’s Guild of American and the Screen Actor’s Guild strikes in Hollywood, as writers and actors are concerned that an AI-generated version of their writing or image and likeness can be used to avoid paying humans for this work.
What are the implications of AI technologies for higher education?
AI-enabled tools have the potential to impact all aspects of campus life, but the immediate impact is related to academic integrity in the classroom, as some students immediately began using Chat GPT and other tools to write papers and complete other assignments for them. Instructors began to raise concerns when papers contained odd phrasing or were uncharacteristically polished compared to papers historically submitted by students in the past. There are tools that are available at PC to detect AI, but these tools can falsely detect a paper written by a student as AI-generated, and instructors have spent a great deal of time trying to prove that a paper or assignment was completed with the assistance of AI.
How has PC responded so far, and how will we be preparing for the future of AI?
At PC we have responded to the growth of AI-enabled tools in several ways:
- We have updated our academic integrity guidance for students by clarifying that content generated with AI-enabled tools such as Chat GPT must be attributed to the source (cited), otherwise the passing off of AI-generated content as one’s own work will be considered plagiarism and a violation of academic integrity.
- Some faculty are trying to update the curriculum by embracing AI to prepare students for an AI-enabled future, while others are trying to teach fundamental skills for which they want students to think for themselves and generate their own unique responses without the help of AI. We have provided guidance to faculty regarding considerations for how AI-enabled tools may or may not be used in their courses and recommended that they spell out their AI policy clearly in course syllabi as well as explicitly discussing their expectations regarding the use of AI-enabled tools with their classes.
- We have created a campus wide AI Committee including representatives from Academic Affairs, the Student Success Center, Teaching and Learning Technologies, the Center for Teaching Excellence, the faculty, Student Affairs, the Library, and Information Technology to address campus wide implications of AI and develop the College’s response. For example, we anticipate that Microsoft will be incorporating a version of generative AI, called Copilot, throughout its operating system as well as the Microsoft Office Suite in the near future. Therefore, we need to better understand how this, and other future AI developments will affect PC students and the College overall.
Christine E. Earley, PhD, CPA (inactive)
Associate Provost for Faculty Development
Professor of Accountancy
cearley@providence.edu
