2023-09-18 12:01:30
At the end of last spring, when Mourad’s little sister*, in L3 sociology, had to start writing her end-of-year dissertation, she felt overwhelmed by her workload: “ Between her studies and her student job, she lacked time to write and prepare her oral presentation” says Mourad.
So the big brother, a former student, but in biology, offered a helping hand – helped by ChatGPT, the text generative artificial intelligence created by OpenAI. “My sister gave me her subject, I made a summary, helped by the AI, then I developed the text again with the AI, adding quotes that I found myself. In a few days, the dissertation was ready, we’re not going to lie: without ChatGPT I wouldn’t have done it so quickly.” Mourad’s work allowed his sister to obtain a 13 out of 20 during her oral presentation.
No conscience issue for the siblings: “No one told my sister that she couldn’t use AI, it’s just a tool that exists, we might as well use it” underlines Mourad. Axel, a medical student who passed his baccalaureate last June, also admits to having used ChatGPT for philosophy homework last year, but only sparingly: “A lot of information like the names of authors, dates, Quotes are partially or entirely false. I mainly used it to reshape certain of my sentences, or to ask for precise definitions, more suitable synonyms.”
Testimonies that do not surprise Magali Conéjéro: this writing professional gives courses in writing efficiency to students from a major engineering school in the Lille region. “Last year, a student asked me if he could use ChatGPT, I admit it took me a little by surprise! I answered ‘no’. In my course, they must learn to communicate correctly in writing, ChatGPT is a fun and fluid tool, which produces texts that are valid in form, but not in substance – it can be dangerous to rely on it.
“Schools will tinker a bit again this year”
Especially if teachers start using text detectors generated by AI: “No tool can reliably assert that this or that content was generated by artificial intelligence,” says Alain Goudey, deputy general director in charge of digital at Neoma BS. It has also been shown that certain detectors have biases which penalize non-native speakers.”
Enough to greatly complicate the task of professors and higher education establishments who see their entire evaluation system potentially called into question by the exponential development of artificial intelligence. “The head of our master’s degree explained to us at the back-to-school meeting that from now on there would be less homework because she won’t know if we did them alone or with ChatGPT” laughs Julie *, in a master’s degree ‘history.
“No tool can reliably assert that this or that content was generated by artificial intelligence”
Alain Goudey, deputy general manager in charge of digital at Neoma BS
But then how to adapt? “The schools will still tinker a little this year, but at the start of the 2024 school year everyone will be ready” reassures this head of a major management school. In fact, the “response” is being organized, but at several speeds. Thus, at Sciences-po Paris, as early as February, the school warned students: a ban on using ChatGPT in the context of written or oral assessments, unless explicitly mentioned, in accordance with the anti-plagiarism charter of school.
For her part, for this new year which is beginning, Magali Conéjéro plans to ask her students for a sample of their writing style during class, which will allow her to better detect AI-assisted plagiarism. At Neoma, the 3,000 first-year students were all entitled to a “keynote” on the proper use of AI, and students in subsequent years will have an online course to explain to them what generative AI is, what are its biases and its limits, what we can do with it or not.
“All the school’s teachers have been invited to check to what extent the work they ask their students is “ChatGPTisable”, adds Alain Goudey. We have come to the conclusion that a student of the school cannot graduate using ChatGPT exclusively. But since AI will be massively and quickly adopted by all companies, we must train our students so that they know how to use it.” For better and not worse.
(* first names have been changed)
#ChatGPT #schools #universities