As a boomer, I am glad most of my life was spent before smartphones (the iPhone was introduced in 2007) or even the Internet. I learned how to write, solve problems without looking up the answer, and focus on tasks for hours without being distracted. Speaking of writing, here's another reason to be grateful that I received my education when I did, and yes, I would have been tempted to use artificial intelligence (AI) had it existed. [bold added]
There’s a Good Chance Your Kid Uses AI to Cheat
A high-school senior from New Jersey doesn’t want the world to know that she cheated her way through English, math and history classes last year.
Yet her experience, which the 17-year-old told The Wall Street Journal with her parent’s permission, shows how generative AI has rooted in America’s education system, allowing a generation of students to outsource their schoolwork to software with access to the world’s knowledge.
Educators see benefits to using artificial intelligence in the classroom. Yet teachers and parents are left on their own to figure out how to stop students from using the technology to short-circuit learning. Companies providing AI tools offer little help.
The New Jersey student told the Journal why she used AI for dozens of assignments last year: Work was boring or difficult. She wanted a better grade. A few times, she procrastinated and ran out of time to complete assignments.
The student turned to OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini, to help spawn ideas and review concepts, which many teachers allow. More often, though, AI completed her work. Gemini solved math homework problems, she said, and aced a take-home test. ChatGPT did calculations for a science lab. It produced a tricky section of a history term paper, which she rewrote to avoid detection.
The student was caught only once.
We are now in the second stage of the AI arms race in education. Teachers are using software to detect the use of AI, and students are using
AI to "humanize" their writing.
Students don’t want to be accused of cheating, so they’re using artificial intelligence to make sure their school essays sound human.
Teachers use AI-detection software to identify AI-generated work. Students, in turn, are pre-emptively running their original writing through the same tools, to see if anything might be flagged for sounding too robotic.
In the workplace of the near future, using artificial intelligence will be a necessary skill. It will also be important to have human workers who can think for themselves. I am very happy to be retired and will be neither a worker or supervisor in that environment.
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