Generative A.I. tools are rapidly evolving, and universities are quickly developing guidelines for how – and if – students should use them in the classroom. But what do students think? This op-ed, written by first-year college student Tylar Macintyre, responds to the growing use of A.I. detector tools to determine whether students have illicitly used generative A.I. chatbots to compose their writing.
Tylar Macintyre, “A.I. Detectors Are the Smoking Guns That Prove Nothing.” Venture, 5 March 2025
- Macintyre describes how teachers turn to A.I. detectors to check if a student’s writing is their own. What’s the central problem with this approach, according to Macintyre? What are the ethical issues with using A.I. detectors on student writing?
- Which groups of students are at a higher risk of being wrongly accused of using generative A.I. in unauthorized ways? Why is their writing flagged at a higher rate than other students?
- Macintyre’s argument draws on his perspective as a student. What is another view that could be part of this conversation about A.I. detectors and academic integrity? Find a place in Macintyre’s essay where he could insert this naysayer perspective. Use the templates from Chapter 6 to name this alternative view and introduce it fairly. How might Macintyre respond to this naysayer?
- So what? Who cares? Macintyre explains the consequences for students whose writing is falsely “flagged” by A.I. detectors. Who else, besides these students, is affected by the increasingly prevalent use of A.I. detectors by educators? How does the use of A.I. detectors in education affect students, teachers, and classroom environments more broadly? You can draw on your own experiences in your response.
- Some have argued that there is a new “cheating vibe” on college campuses fueled in part by online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic and the rapid development of generative A.I. Read this op-ed by a student at Washington University in St. Louis, who argues that academic integrity standards need to be redefined for the realities of the 21st century. What two main reasons does he give to support his argument? Respond to his argument: do you agree, disagree, or both?
They Say I Blog 
After reading this article about how Artificial Intelligence is significantly changing the way coursework is done I think it is truly hurting the students of our generation. The idea of AI for me personally, I disagree with it in its entirety which also means I agree with this article. I truly believe that at one point because this wasn’t a thing for my parents to use and a resource for them that we as students don’t need this resource either. This is also not helping the students like me, who don’t use AI and could be accused of using it when it is just their excelled writing. Because of AI, it makes me as a college student feel very unsure with any assignment I’ve turned in given these professors have begun to rely on these AI detectors when to me I don’t even use it for any of my assignments. Now don’t get me wrong, AI is a great tool for other reasons but for academic purposes I think it is the worst advancement that technology has ever come up with because it hurts in both ways whether your using it and get caught or if you don’t use it and get accused of that because others are relying heavily on it in every assignment they do. While it seems, many have argued that the positives and benefits of AI outweigh the negatives I strongly believe that this is the worst thing to have happened for education because it is not allowing us as students to use our brains properly and rely on a robot to give this generic answer that is not always the right answer or even the correct answer. So circling back to this article, I agree with all the points that have been made because this technological advancement is the worst thing to happen in our generation and all the points made about students, professors, and assignments are only hurting the students and isn’t displaying the work done in a positive light and rather are being looked at as students cheating when a lot of the time that isn’t the case.
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After reading the article, I agree that AI is changing schoolwork in a negative way. I personally don’t like using AI for academic work, and I don’t think students today really need it just because it exists. One problem is that students who don’t use AI, like me, can still be accused of using it because teachers now rely on AI detectors that aren’t always accurate. It makes turning in assignments feel stressful even when the work is completely our own. While AI can be helpful in other areas, I think it creates more issues than benefits in school.
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