With the new school year starting up, so is the recent question of AI in classrooms.
Simulated technology like Chat GPT, Quill Bot AI, and Bard AI, have become increasingly popular in recent months and have begun to show up as a trend in schoolwork. Essays, discussion boards, and even math worksheets can be used with the help of ideas that aren’t coming from students.
As AI becomes more prominently used in academic settings, it begs the question of whether it will be a positive or negative development.
“I think it depends on how you use it, right?” said senior Nick Blasi. “I think if you use it as a tool it can be very helpful—you just need to know the difference between a tool and something that does the work for you.”
This opinion is one that is shared by many students on campus. They feel that while AI can be taken advantage of by students with the wrong intentions, it can also be extremely helpful and a great asset while doing their assignments.
Another Venice Senior, Hugo Rosenblatt, said “It’s fine to an extent because some students will use it to cheat but if you use it for research or ideas for your essays I think it’s fine.”
Teachers who are most confronted with this new development, tend to have differing opinions then those of their students.
As AI becomes more popular, they are the ones noticing the use of it in assignments being turned into them. With the increased use of AI, teachers are beginning to see it as more of a cheating method than a resource. They are becoming concerned about how it will affect students in the future if they don’t learn to do work for themselves.
“I think instead of learning to think critically ourselves we are relying too much on technology,” said English teacher Ruth Greene. “Kids are just not learning how to think”
However, while some teachers have negative opinions about AI, they are beginning to use it themselves. Eduaide.Ai, a virtual teacher’s assistant tool, is an AI system being implemented for teachers. This software can help write lesson plans, instructions, announcements, and even emails home to parents. All it takes is a brief sentence about what the teacher needs from it and it can create a fully detailed lesson in seconds which teachers can then edit to how they want it.
“I’ve been using it and I love it,” said graphic design and screenprinting teacher Eduardo Serna. “Imagine how many older teachers wasted time at home trying to create a lesson plan, content, curriculum, for their classes. This does most of it for you.”
This AI system is shaping up to be a great asset for teachers in the future. They believe they spend so much time teaching, lesson planning, and communicating with parents when they could save so much by using AI as a tool. Since things made by eduaide.AI can be so easily edited, there is also not a complete reliance on this technology.
AI is becoming a commonly used resource that is changing the way that students and teachers approach their work. As this development increases, it is still yet to be seen how this will affect schools in the long run.
“It’s changing the neural pathways in our brains.” Ruth Greene says. “Hopefully not irrevocably.”
