Is the modern university graduate going to be ready for the real world? That is the question that came out of a recent AI review of term papers submitted in an introductory History class at North City University.

Dr. T. Wellington of the university’s History Department noticed that one or two of the end of term assignments submitted in his introductory history class contained research information and divergent ideas different from those normally presented in AI-assisted papers. Dr. Wellington wondered if the AI algorithm was malfunctioning or had been deliberately feed non-standard website source material. Or worse yet, he wondered, were some of students purposely ignoring modern technological research methods in favor of reading.

When Wellington ran an AI-assisted analysis of the term papers, his worse fears were confirmed. Some of the essays contained material obviously written by humans.

“This is a bigger problem than it might seem at first.” Wellington went on to explain, “If students begin to simply write papers using non-AI generated sources, their essays may not include all the specific keywords that my marking AI program is looking for. This would mean that I would have to go back to the time-consuming task of reading each term papers separately. I would have to assign a grade based on specific content and student understanding rather than assigning keyword searches. In the modern world that our students are about to enter, this analog method is virtually never done.”

“Next thing we would have to expect students to attend class regularly and participate in face-to-face discussions, something that many students are just not comfortable with.”

“Haven’t we always had negative reactions to new technologies? I remember when calculators first came in, everyone said that that was the end of students being able to do basic math. And that didn’t happen did it? What is the difference between introducing a machine to do basic math into classrooms and introducing a machine into classrooms that entertains, informs, communicates, presents and processes data, writes, guides, teaches, shapes behaviours and even simulates friendship. They are virtual the same thing.”