Generative artificial intelligence systems (AIs) or algorithms that can generate content such as text, images, video, audio, and code have transformed the way we imagine the educational landscape. Although large language models (LLMs) were available in the public domain since 2018, the ChatGPT interface's emergence in November 2022 and GPT-4 in March 2023 accelerated its impact and generated debates around the implications of AI in education. It was followed by a range of AI tools like Bing from Microsoft, Bard from Google, and so on.

Generative AIs have adverse impacts on educational systems that depend on traditional learning assessments and several educational institutions have banned the use of ChatGPT and other similar AI systems. The education department of New York banned ChatGPT on its networks considering the negative impacts it can have on student learning. Australian universities took the initiative to change their examination system to avoid cheating through AI tools. Many universities moved to in-class assignments or included viva voce for assessments. Developers have also come up with AI-detecting tools like Hugging Face Plagiarism Detector and GPTZero to identify AI-assisted submissions. However, on the other side, others argue that the present panic could be managed through effective checks and balances. 

UNESCO-led Beijing Consensus on Artificial Intelligence and Education is the first policy that came up as a result of the international conference on artificial intelligence and education in 2019. It voices for every nation to have sound policies to systematically integrate AI and education to aid innovative teaching-learning. Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) need to have policy responses to ensure checks and balances against generative AIs. The top-down policy approach may focus on banning the use of generative AIs. But participatory and adaptive approaches focus on developing policies that could accept the use of generative AIs in varying degrees, with the realisation that generative AIs are here to stay. If we adopt this approach, it necessitates the revisiting of pedagogy as well as assessment patterns.  

Generative AIs vs student creativity 

Using appropriate strategies to arouse sustained curiosity among students and having more creative and analytical assessments can make the classrooms alive. HEIs like United International College in Hong Kong and the University of Adelaide have developed policies that help them to explore the ways in which generative AIs can assist the teaching-learning process in an ethical manner. 

Algorithms like ChatGPT use static data (as of now until 2021) and do not rely on real-time data. This does not mean we need to develop assessments and written tasks based on real-time data alone. How will you address a student who argues that he/she used a generative AI to complete the task, but paraphrased? How can we include a statement of AI use in our course plans and initiate classroom discussions on it?  

Another problem is the possible bias when we depend on generative AIs as these algorithms generate data based on what is available in the online spaces. Especially in social science, the power equations in the generation and dissemination of knowledge and the regional biases, when one relies only on online data, need to be addressed. The usage of multiple sources and the significance of grey literature is equally important to develop one’s critical skills. Some of the significant future skills as reflected in the World Economic Forum report include creativity, critical thinking, and deep learning. Are technological innovations like generative AIs hinder you to acquire these skills, which further leads to a very intricate power equation in terms of knowledge creation and knowledge management?

Generating classroom discussions

How can we generate discussions on AIs in classrooms? Is AI contributing to our learning or making people dependent on it? Is it a strategy that distances us from our own intellect? Is it making any task mechanical without urging us to think about the essence of what we do? At an ethical level, we need to initiate discussions on these in a community that may be vulnerable to these advancements. 

The famous Italian scholar Antonio Gramsci was very concerned about how knowledge is produced in society and disseminated. One of the major themes he discusses in Prison Notebooks is the role of intellectuals. According to him, an intellectual is anyone who is performing the social function of communicating with or educating non-specialists. The traditional intellectuals consider themselves as a category apart from other class divisions and an organic intellectual embedded and operating within the power structures of society. 

Who is developing AI? Who is going to fund the AI projects? What are the future trends? All these questions are also connected with a much larger question - are we in need of more organic intellectuals to continually pose a critical stance to dissect the impact of AIs in the domain of knowledge creation? What role an HEI can play in this regard? The policies of HEIs will not be complete if they miss out on these larger questions while formulating plans to integrate AI.

(The writer is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and Social Work, CHRIST (Deemed to be University), Bangalore, Karnataka. Views are personal. She can be reached at maya.m@christuniversity.in/ drmaya2021@outlook.com)