Under pressure from two closely approaching deadlines and struggling with stress and Covid, Hannah, a university student, decided to use artificial intelligence (AI) to help write one of her essays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI was incredibly stressed and under enormous pressure to do well. My brain had completely given up,\u201d she explains. Her experience now serves as a cautionary tale, as she faced an academic misconduct panel for her actions, risking expulsion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This incident underscores a growing challenge for universities as they encourage AI literacy while trying to curb academic misconduct. Hannah\u2019s misuse of AI came to light when her lecturer ran her essay through detection software. “My stomach was in knots outside the office. I knew this was really stupid,” she recalls. The tutor, who noticed a sharp decline in the essay\u2019s quality midway, flagged the assignment. “You were doing well until this point,” her tutor observed. Hannah received a zero and soon after an email about possible academic misconduct.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Initially, she considered denying her actions, but seeing the high AI percentage flagged on the screen made her confess. Although she admitted to using AI, the panel ultimately found insufficient evidence to punish her, leaving her with a warning instead. \u201cI could have been kicked out,\u201d she admits. “I massively regret it. I was doing really well and felt pressured to keep those grades high. It\u2019s also my first year, which may have factored into the panel\u2019s decision not to escalate the case.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Reflecting on her experience, she says, \u201cIt really tainted that year for me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Generative AI, a technology that mimics human-like responses, has universities rethinking how to manage AI use and discourage misuse. Some institutions restrict AI entirely unless specifically authorized, while others allow limited uses, such as grammar checks, or permit AI-generated content as long as it\u2019s fully cited. Taylor, a university student in Canterbury, says he uses AI as a study tool. “It\u2019s like a search engine. You can ask it questions to help structure your work,” he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Other students, however, feel conflicted about AI misuse among peers. Zyren, another student, admitted that a friend using AI to generate entire essays left her feeling frustrated, as the friend might score higher with less effort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Universities UK, an organization representing university vice-chancellors, acknowledges the risks of AI in assessments, affirming that universities maintain strict codes of conduct and penalties for academic misconduct. A spokesperson for the Department for Education also noted that while AI has transformative potential, its integration into teaching, learning, and assessment must be managed with care, both to leverage its benefits and to mitigate risks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Under pressure from two closely approaching deadlines and struggling with stress and Covid, Hannah, a university student, decided to use artificial intelligence (AI) to help write one of her essays. \u201cI was incredibly stressed and under enormous pressure to do well. My brain had completely given up,\u201d she explains. Her experience now serves as a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":532,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/winsmediagh.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}