Dealing with ChatGPT as a Techno Detox
Dr. Munshi Muhammad Abdul Kader Jilani :
The development of OpenAI’s ChatGPT has cast strong attention on Generative AI systems and their potential effects on academic integrity. Artificially intelligent generative systems are built to create new content or output based on input data. Although OpenAI’s ChatGPT isn’t the first Gen-AI system ever designed, it does mark a significant step forward in the field of Generative AI technology. Many academic community members have voiced concerns about a lack of intellectual honesty. Education professionals have long debated on technological developments and their use in classrooms. The range of these debates ranges from children using cellphones in class to the use of cutting-edge technology such as ARISTO, a system that can pass eighth-grade level exams.
Artificial intelligence-powered text generators (AITGs) are another technological advancement that academics must deal with. At the beginning of this year, an AITG called ChatGPT came to the forefront. It answers questions in text like a chatbot; however it well beyond a simple chatbot. It can instantly write articles, summaries, essays, and even code in a matter of seconds. There are several potential applications in education, particularly for students who utilize ChatGPT to complete homework and test questions.
While some voiced concerns that using ChatGPT unethically might harm or compromise their academic learning objectives, process and future goals, Academics nonetheless took a step back when discussing its consequences and ramifications asking, “Should we accommodate or endure?”.
The potency of ChatGPT offers fascinating new avenues for pedagogical exploration. Most agree that academia should focus less on passively passing on information and more on encouraging students to develop their knowledge, skills, and capacities in social and technological contexts. Moreover, knowledge acquisition has become more egalitarian due to information access, and ChatGPT may combine and synthesize information from many sources-albeit not without prejudice. The Financial Times published a commentary on a study by a professor at Wharton Business School on January 21 that outlines how the author, Christian Terwiesch, tested ChatGPT3 on an exam in a required course for his MBA. The ChatGPT bot got surpassed grades (within B and a B-) and fared better than the vast majority of the human students in the class. These circumstances undoubtedly offer a massive issue for academic institutions and business schools. Still, rather than viewing ChatGPT as a jeopardy, educators and their institutions should evaluate its benefits and employ them to help students accomplish their learning goals.
Initially, doubts and fears existed regarding the adoption of ChatGPT in education. First, the possibility of counterfeiting written content such as reports, articles, examinations, and practice tests using AITGs; recognizing and dealing with unethical activity in student material; and supporting ethical research with the use of trustworthy and dependable sources of information are vital issues; Second, the bias, constraints, and inconsistency of AITGs in creating replies on specific questions, which may have a detrimental impact on students’ learning goals and learning process while also fostering prejudices and other inaccuracies. Third, students’ over-dependence on AITGs might prevent them from developing interpersonal interaction with teachers and peers, problem-solving, and critical thinking skills. Finally, due to AITGs’ incapacity to evaluate uniqueness among other soft skills, assessing students’ tasks may be flawed or inappropriate.
It is imperative for interventions to ensure that students in future generations receive better AI training and are more equipped for the hurdles they will encounter in the workplace. It is a duty to assist students in enhancing their critical thinking abilities by requiring them to evaluate content generated by artificial intelligence with trustworthy, reputable sources of knowledge. It is also worth making an effort to create an exciting learning environment for pupils, both real and virtual. Hence, the academic program should feature more oral presentations and in-person tests in the curriculum. To preserve the validity of student evaluations, many Australian universities, for instance, have already declared a return to in-person examinations. In other words, instead of focusing on the “product” of students’ learning, we should assess their “process” of education.
With these suggestions, we are urging a more flexible strategy; meanwhile, other instructors are opting for a more resistive stance. Some academics have attempted to render AITGs worthless by posing progressively difficult test and assignment tasks and requesting uncorroborated or private info that AI technology cannot convey, also in addition to utilizing software that restricts students’ access to the remainder of their system while completing exams or assignments. Finally, by developing trustworthy and affordable strategies for spotting potentially fraudulent use of AI tools in global academic institutions. It essentially ‘Fights fire with fire’.
ChatGPT has created a buzz within academia and has caused pressure on many institutions to act immediately. Some have resorted to enacting policy changes that are inconvenient at the middle of a term. Considering the advent of this transformation and the understanding that it will take place in a matter of weeks not decades, it has left academics in confusion on how to proceed. While it is not yet understood if this will be revolutionary like the Gutenberg printing press or the first stone writing tablet, this progress will be nonetheless pivotal for education and academia. Hence, it is important to have an accommodating and inclusive strategy in order to successfully employ AI technology in classrooms as a means to augment and improve teaching instead of substituting them altogether. It must be utilized as a facilitator and tool to assist students and maximize their learning for the future.
(The writer is Assistant Professor in Human Resource Management at the Bangladesh Institute of Governance and Management).
