ChatGPT has taken the world by storm, recording 1.6 billion visits to the website and more than a 100 million users — beating other popular sites such Instagram, which took 2.5 years to see that kind of activity.

In the time since its release last November, Microsoft has included ChatGPT into its Bing search engine with Google following suit with its AI chatbot, Bard. This new framework allows for the ability to go through more information such as being able to analyze pictures. 

The growth of these AI assistants posit various possible effects on education like academic dishonesty, with teachers and the district moving to react to the change. 

New possible benefits

As students become increasingly aware of the technology, Westmont teacher Dianne Leo gave a presentation during the teacher development conference regarding ChatGPT, which was attended by more than a hundred teachers.

“We can’t run from ChatGPT or pretend it doesn’t exist,” Leo said. “We need to learn how to work with it and incorporate it into our classrooms or at least let students know that we’re aware of (it).”

Leo teaches AP Language and English 4, as well as the coordinator for EL TOSA (for English learners), and finds different potential uses for the program in her classes. 

She sees a possibility where all students can use ChatGPT to proofread their work, such as asking where evidence could be added or where a section could be improved upon. 

AP U.S. History teacher Stefanie Menera also said a student could use an AI assistant when making sure that a passage they have written matches with a rubric that a teacher has provided. She also said how AI assistants could be used as starting points for research or a way to get ideas. 

“That is a useful and an ethically acceptable way to use it,” Menera said. 

Leo also highlighted benefits that ChatGPT and similar programs can have when teaching English learners. This can come in the form of translating or using the software to help explain topics in a simple manner. 

In math teacher Ramani Visvanathan’s AP Calculus class, students already use online tools such as Desmos and Wolfram Alpha to check their work. For Visvanathan, use of ChatGPT to check work is fine as long as students are doing the work and making an effort to understand concepts. 

Use of ChatGPT for teachers

Menera has used ChatGPT as an equivalent to a teaching assistant that helps complete basic tasks.

She first heard about the program in a Facebook group with AP U.S. History teachers. Menera also got more information on the matter from an educational technology CUE conference this March in Palm Springs.

She is now using the program to make random groups, take a detailed instruction set and break it down or make a rubric. She compares ChatGPT to using a calculator, another tool.

“As teachers, there are so many decisions that we have to make in a day and so many tasks that we have to complete that if there’s any way that I can find a resource or a tool to make my job more efficient, even if it’s in a small way,” Menera said. 

Despite its usefulness, ChatGPT has been prone to making many errors. Menera recalls how she tested the program to make a rubric for the AP U.S. History final after she had written a detailed description of the assignment; yet, the program had included categories that did not exist and failed to include others that she had already included. 

Need for student responsibility and teacher concerns

With these new programs, comes additional efforts by teachers and administrators across the country to make sure improper use does not proliferate. 

“The teacher should educate their students (on) how they should be using AI for their benefit. Make sure you use AI to check your work rather than do your work,” Visvanathan said. 

For Visvanathan, this comes in the form of focusing on the concepts and the proper notation to use, something that AI assistants may not provide.

“Writing is an important part of mathematics, but students won’t know how to document their work because they are using a documentation which is not theirs,” he said. “Students won’t know what to put on paper because they’re looking at something else done for them.”

For example, students need to know the proper format for integrals that are checked in the AP exam. 

Teachers may also be able to tell when AI use takes place, noticing details that separate it from work previously done by a student. 

“There’s some element of student-ness in the work that can be easily distinguished by a teacher,” Visvanathan said.

Menera agrees and explains how she can recognize changes to a student’s writing style. She also said that the lack of sourcing from students who use AI assistants is another indicator. 

Teachers emphasize the need for student responsibility, such as knowing appropriate times to use the AI. 

“Just like you would with any teacher or peer, you decide how you use the advice and how you incorporate it into your essay,” Leo said. “You can’t let the machine do your thinking for you.”

This proofreading also extends into citing sources when using the program for research. Leo urged the students to follow up on sources to make sure that they are properly cited. 

Additionally, Leo warned that using these tools irresponsibly will adversely affect students, as they may not be prepared to write during an AP exam or in future classes they take. She also emphasized that handwritten work will remain and students need to stay prepared for it. When students take the AP Language exam they need to be able to synthesize documents and come up with their own argument for a prompt, among other tasks. 

Principal Lindsay Schubert compares student use of ChatGPT to her time as a teacher and managing students’ use of Wikipedia, in a similar situation as with managing recent AI assistants. She said that it was a good method to get ideas and get some basic information, but it then required further research to check the accuracy of the information from a reliable source. 

For Schubert, it is important to manage the benefits of the technology while keeping the principles of current education intact. 

“We have to figure out how to find that balance between using it as a tool and knowing how to cite that and how to incorporate that into the research process, but still make sure that we’re not relying on it to the point that students aren’t learning the skills to be able to write and to be able to construct their own thoughts, because that’s really important,” Schubert said. 

Moving forward

As of now, students who use their personal computers at school have easier access to AI assistants than those who use Chromebooks due to its security programs such as GoGuardian.

Although it is not solely in response to AI, Schubert said a goal next year will focus on making sure that students use their Chromebooks for classwork in an effort to ensure security as well as making sure necessary tools, like Canvas, are available to all students. Exemptions would still apply to use outside of class or if a different type of computer is needed for an assignment.

In an effort to respond to the growing presence of ChatGPT and other AI assistants, German Cerda, Assistant Superintendent of Educational Services, sent a districtwide email sharing the county’s plans to develop a policy for AI use for school.

For Schubert, she is not certain about the effects of a total ban on AI assistants while also acknowledging future concerns about student work.

“Anytime you just ban something outright, it’s not really going to work and so we definitely want to still uphold our expectations about integrity and not turning in stuff that’s not your own,” she said. “But if it’s going to be something that could be useful or a tool that’s going to be around no matter what, we might as well learn how to deal with it.”