ChatGPT in education

The usage of ChatGPT in education has sparked considerable debate and exploration. ChatGPT is a chatbot based on large language models (LLMs) that was released by OpenAI in November 2022.

Output from ChatGPT generating an essay draft

ChatGPT's adoption in education was rapid, but it was initially banned by several institutions. The potential benefits include enhancing personalized learning, improving student productivity, assisting with brainstorming, summarization, and supporting language literacy skills. Students have generally reported positive perceptions, but specific views from educators and students vary widely. Opinions are especially varied on what constitutes appropriate use of ChatGPT in education. Efforts to ban chatbots like ChatGPT in schools focus on preventing cheating, but enforcement faces challenges due to AI detection inaccuracies and widespread accessibility of chatbot technology. In response, many educators are now exploring ways to thoughtfully integrate generative AI into assessments.

Background

Generative pre-trained transformer (GPT) models are large language models trained to generate text. ChatGPT is a virtual assistant developed by OpenAI and based on GPT models. It launched in November 2022 and has had significant improvements as new GPT models were released. After pre-training, these GPT models were fine-tuned to adopt an assistant role, improve response accuracy and reduce harmful content; using supervised learning and reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF).^[1] Due to the training methods, ChatGPT can produce many plausible sounding falsehoods a concept sometimes referred to as hallucination.^[2][3]

ChatGPT gained over 100 million users in only two months following its release, becoming the fastest-growing consumer software application in history.^[4] Similar chatbots include Gemini and Claude.

Applications

Proponents argue for integrating ChatGPT into educational frameworks responsibly, leveraging its potential to enhance learning outcomes through personalized approaches.^[5][6] Student perceptions of ChatGPT are generally positive, with many finding it to be an effective tool for learning, productivity, and problem-solving.^[7] A global study found that approximately 58% of students reported finding the AI tool useful in their daily lives. When asked to describe their views on ChatGPT in writing, the most common terms used were "good", "helpful", and "tool", reflecting an overall favorable perception of the platform. The study also highlighted that ChatGPT was particularly beneficial in blended learning environments, where a significant portion of learning is conducted online. Though the majority of students still expressed a preference for in-person assistance over AI, they acknowledged the value of ChatGPT as a helpful resource, especially when in-person support was unavailable.^[8]

A global survey from 2024 found that students primarily use ChatGPT for brainstorming, summarization, and research assistance, finding it effective for simplifying complex information but less reliable for factual accuracy and classroom learning. While students recognized its potential to enhance AI literacy and digital communication professors highlighted significant limitations in critical thinking, interpersonal communication, and decision-making skills.^[8]

AI tools like ChatGPT have shown promise in enhancing literacy skills among adolescents and adults learning English as a second language. They provide instant feedback on writing, aid in idea generation, and help improve grammar and vocabulary.^[9] These tools can also support students with disabilities, such as dyslexia, by assisting with spelling and grammar.^[10][11] Additionally, AI can facilitate higher-order thinking by automating lower-order tasks, allowing students to focus on complex conceptual work. On the other hand, LLMs may perpetuated biases in the training data and it is unclear how to treat student's data privacy.^[11]

In a 2023 study ChatGPT generated a SWOT analysis of itself in an educational setting, identifying several key issues and potential uses. The study authors then highlighted that while ChatGPT can generate human-like responses and assist with personalized learning, it also has limited factual accuracy. The study noted that ChatGPT's responses often lacked depth in understanding broader educational goals and processes, and focused primarily on providing immediate answers to queries. The potential biases in ChatGPT's training data and the ethical implications of its use were also discussed, particularly concerning the control exerted by its developers over the content it generates.^[12]

Technology writer Dan Gillmor used ChatGPT in 2022 on a student assignment, and found its generated text was on par with what a good student would deliver and opined that "academia has some very serious issues to confront".^[13]

Geography professor Terence Day assessed in 2023 citations generated by ChatGPT and found them to be fake. Despite this, he writes that "the titles of the fake articles are all directly relevant to the questions and could potentially make excellent papers. The lack of a genuine citation could signal an opportunity for an enterprising author to fill a void." According to Day, it is possible to generate high-quality introductory college courses using ChatGPT; he used it to write materials for "introductory physical geography courses, my second-year course in geographical hydrology, and second-year cartography, geographic information systems, and remote sensing." He concludes that "this approach could have significant relevance for open learning and could potentially affect current textbook publishing models."^[14] ChatGPT was also seen as an opportunity for cheap and individualized tutoring, leading to the creation of specialized chatbots like Khanmigo.^[15]

Adoption into assignments

The use of AI in education has vast potential, as it can provide personalized learning experiences and adaptive teaching methods.^[16] Andrew Maynard and Jules White both developed university courses specifically for prompt engineering generative AI chatbots.^[17] Several professors have incorporated ChatGPT into assignments.^[18][19] One stated that the usage of ChatGPT generally improved his students' work by using AI to further assist in the generation of ideas.^[18] These professors acknowledged it is not feasible or practical to ban students from using it, and stressed on the importance of being responsible users of AI.^[18][19]

Impact

Daniel Herman's perspective reflects concerns about the potential devaluation of writing skills if AI can generate text as easily as humans.^[20] Similarly, Naomi S. Baron wrote "If AI text generation does our writing for us, we diminish opportunities to think out problems for ourselves".^[21] She also mentioned the risk of a slippery slope, where students start letting generative AI control the content and style of their writing, leading to a diminished sense of ownership.^[21] Others highlight the need for educators to adapt their methods to focus more on critical thinking and reasoning,^[22] as AI tools like ChatGPT could potentially be used for plagiarism or produce biased content.

Writing centers may be particularly impacted by the growing use of ChatGPT in education. Although there are local policies on AI usage, university-wide policies are currently not well established, and with this comes a burden that is placed on writing center tutors, who may have to act as "police clients for unethical AI-generated writing". According to a 2024 survey done on writing centers, participants stated that they believed they would need to be able to advise clients on the "ethical issues of using AI tools" and "recognize AI-generated text and discuss academic integrity".^[23]

Jordan MacDonald noted that students who use ChatGPT to retrieve information on a topic may lack the knowledge required to identify false or misleading information.^[24] Students' over-reliance on ChatGPT may impact their cognitive offloading and memory retention.^[25]

Academic integrity

ChatGPT's capability to generate assignments has prompted concerns about academic integrity, particularly in essay writing, with critics foreseeing potential misuse and devaluation of traditional writing skills.^[26][27][28] A survey conducted between March and April 2023 revealed 58% of American students acknowledged using ChatGPT, with 38% admitting use without teacher consent, highlighting challenges in enforcing bans.^[29][30] Students have shown strongly differing opinions on the extent to which the use of ChatGPT should be viewed as misconduct.^[31][32] Kevin Roose stated that ChatGPT's prohibition was impractical to enforce. Students can access the internet outside of schools, effectively rendering a ban obsolete; he further suggested that teachers allow it openly for some assignments similar to calculators, and that teaching with the AI is the best approach.^[5]

A professor at Texas A&M University misused ChatGPT to check student assignments for verifying whether an assignment utilized the large language model. ChatGPT claimed all the students used it, and so the professor gave a failing grade to all of his students. In fact, ChatGPT is unable to reliably verify whether it was used to write a piece of text. A post to a Reddit community dedicated to ChatGPT received widespread attention with many attacking the professor for a lack of familiarity towards the chatbot.^[33][34]

Universities have stated serious concerns with the integrity of their curriculum due to students using ChatGPT and other AI tools. Baylor University asked students to submit handwritten essays in order to uphold academic integrity. The oral exam has also been used as an example of an instruction method which could circumvent the assignment and test students' knowledge more effectively on a 1:1 basis.^[6]

Placing digital watermarks on AI-generated content to distinguish it from original student work may ameliorate this problem in the future.^[35][36]

Business

In response to educational demand, OpenAI launched "ChatGPT Edu" in May 2024, aiming to offer universities affordable access to this technology.^[37]

The education technology company Chegg, which was a website dedicated to helping students with assignments using a database of collected worksheets and assignments, became one of the most prominent business victims to ChatGPT, with its stock price nearly being cut in half after a quarterly earnings call in May 2023.^[38][39]

Bans

Some educational institutions have chosen to ban access to ChatGPT. The reasons behind these decisions likely vary, but concerns about potential misuse, such as plagiarism or reliance on AI for writing tasks, could be driving factors. ChatGPT has been met with various bans from certain educational institutions. One of the earliest districts to ban the tool was the Los Angeles Unified School District, which blocked access to the tool less than a month after its official release.^[40] The New York City Department of Education blocked access to ChatGPT announced a ban around January 4, 2023.^[41][42][43]

In February 2023, the University of Hong Kong sent a campus-wide email to instructors and students stating that the use of ChatGPT or other AI tools is prohibited in all classes, assignments and assessments at the university. Any violations would be treated as plagiarism by the university unless the student obtains the prior written consent from the course instructor.^[44][45]

Repeals

Some schools in the United States for the 2023–24 school year announced a repeal of their bans for ChatGPT. In May 2023, New York City repealed its ban on ChatGPT.^[46] Davis Banks, the head of New York City’s public schools at the time, explained that the initial decision to ban the tool was driven by a "knee-jerk fear [that] overlooked the potential of generative AI to support students and teachers". He also recognized that AI would inevitably be a part of students' future workplaces and argued that teaching them to use it ethically would be more beneficial than imposing a blanket ban. With the ban lifted, educators in New York City now have the opportunity to use ChatGPT for various educational purposes, including teaching about AI prejudice and creating lessons. To assist in this transition, the city's Department of Education committed to providing educators with “resources, real-life examples of successful AI implementation in schools, and an AI toolkit”.^[47]

Another district, Walla Walla Public Schools, located in rural Washington, also lifted its ban on ChatGPT starting in the 2023–24 school year. To support this transition, the district hosted a daylong workshop that focused on the positive learning benefits of AI in the classroom. The event was attended by around 100 local educators. Following the workshop, many of these participants expressed a newfound confidence in integrating ChatGPT into their educational plans.^[40]

Detection software

Main article: Artificial intelligence content detection

Some companies have responded to the influx of ChatGPT and generative AI usage among students by developing detection software which flags down essays likely written by AI.^[48][49] Among the first companies to develop solutions like this was Turnitin. A corporate blog post from the company stated that the company's database of numerous student essays was used to train its own detection system. When tested by The Washington Post, it was noted that Turnitin's detector flagged an innocent student for using ChatGPT to generate the conclusion of her essay.^[50] The company reported that its detector was 98% accurate.^[51][52] There have been numerous other cases similar to this in which a student is falsely accused of using AI and report not knowing how to prove their innocence.^[53] This is especially prevalent among already marginalized groups such as non-native English speakers, black students, and neurodiverse students due to AI detection tools being more likely to flag writing by these groups as a result of linguistic differences.^[54]

Other similar detection tools include GPTZero and ones by numerous other startups, including OpenAI itself. However, research reports have stated that detection software often fails to detect content generated by AI, and that these tools are easy to fool.^[55][56][49] Tools such as AI humanizers, which aim to make AI-generated text appear more human-like, help to trick AI detectors.^[57] OpenAI's official AI detection tool, Classifier, launched in January 2023, and was later taken down in August 2023 due to low usage and accuracy issues.^[58][59][60]

To combat false accusations of academic dishonesty, AI detection creators and educators recommend not relying solely on these tools.^[61] Educators should clearly state their policies on what qualifies as AI-usage and learn more about AI tools themselves.^[62] In 2023, some scholars predicted that truly reliable AI text detection may never be possible. As generative AI models continue to closely replicate human language, distinguishing between human- and AI-generated text is expected to become increasingly challenging.^[49]

See also

• AI in education
• Educational technology