Disclaimer: While seventy-two students responded to the form, only eighteen faculty members were able to respond. These sample sizes must be kept in mind while reading this article—the responses discussed here do not represent the views of the entire faculty or the student body.
Faculty members and students use Generative A.I. (Gen. AI) in different ways and for different purposes, but share similar emotions surrounding the subject. Both students and faculty appreciate the efficiency and accessibility of Gen. AI but understand its defects. While students are mainly concerned about the environmental and possible future social effects of Gen. AI, the displeasures of the faculty seem to focus on many instances of inaccuracies, made-up data, and how many features cost extra.
When asked to rate how worried they were about the prevalence of Gen. AI in our society on a 1-10 scale, with one meaning not worried, the most common number was ‘seven’ for students and ‘five’ for faculty. In general, more people are worried about Gen. AI than not. However, no faculty member rated themselves as either a one or a ten, which may demonstrate a greater neutrality than the student body. Perhaps this is because faculty members have lived longer and thus tend less toward extremism than teenagers with still-developing prefrontal cortexes.
The percentage of surveyed faculty who have used Gen. AI is slightly less than the percentage of surveyed students, with a yes rate of 83.3% among faculty members and 84.7% among students. For both groups, the percentage dropped when the use was applied to a school- or work-related assignment, with a yes rate of 72.2% for faculty versus 66.7% for students. The greater percentage of faculty versus students could demonstrate that adults have a greater trust in themselves than students to use Gen. AI responsibly in a work-related context, or it could mean adults have a greater reliance on Gen. AI than students. Other data, however, refutes this second theory.
The synthesis of later questions reveals that, while many students continually use Gen. AI once they have used it, several faculty members mentioned not having used it for weeks, months, or even years. This could prove a greater self-control or a more delicate use of a tool, which would support the theory that adults have a greater trust in themselves than adolescents and disprove the theory of adult reliance. Faculty Gen. AI usage ranges from restructuring documents and creating citations to planning vacations or simply exploring new technology.
However, one must consider whether adults’ trust in themselves is well-placed. The percentages of Gen. AI usage fall in the 80%-90% category for both students and faculty, but when asked to estimate this percentage, students’ estimates proved more accurate than faculty. The majority of faculty estimated that 90%-100% of responders had used Gen. AI before, which could demonstrate a worse ability to estimate or a subconscious fear that everything around them is Gen. AI. If the second option, this could demonstrate a greater global awareness of the temporary, which could lead towards a lack of calm, logic-based decision-making.
Additionally, many faculty responders (and non-responders who have expressed their views personally) worry about a general student (and, extendedly, worldwide) trend away from accepting struggle as part of the learning process. This trend toward student complacency makes teaching more difficult, as faculty members struggle to encourage perseverance and student-to-student relationships.
Faculty respondents also mentioned diminishing trust in digital messaging, even in official channels. While this distrust is not unfounded, it might be a relief to know that 61.1% of faculty responders refuse to use Gen. AI to write emails, and even those who do use Gen. AI may only use it in a refining or proofreading context.
Many responders said that learning how to use Gen. AI in the right context with the right mindset can be an incredible boon to students’ learning and to the culture of LJCDS as a whole. The responders celebrate how it can accelerate discovery, creation, and production, but laments how it is a step away from creativity and media literacy.
When asked whether faculty members encouraged students or colleagues to use Gen. AI, the most common response was neither. However, the second most common response was that the responder encouraged both their students and their colleagues to use AI. While at this point we, as a society, are not sure of the effects of Gen. AI in the long run, this incredible difference in responses only highlights the general confusion across all age groups.
Some confusion might be assuaged by students’ responses to questions as to what they would be okay with using Gen. AI on, and where they would draw the line. When given examples of Gen. AI usage in background information, idea generation, small grammar edits, or feedback, students were almost evenly split. Some stated using Gen. AI in this way is similar to going to a parent, teacher, or friend and asking them to proofread. This is a reason why these responders find Gen AI helpful—it’s faster and more convenient than trying to find an available proofreader.
When it came to having Generative AI write one’s thesis for oneself, however, the majority of those surveyed heavily disagreed, with only 12.5% saying the use of Gen. AI to create a thesis is okay. And when responders were asked whether they would be okay with having Gen. AI write their essay for them, the unanimous response (100%) was no.
Responses to the survey—and the varied interpretations that can be applied to this data—leave this reporter with one main question. If the portion of the high school that responded to the survey all indicated they would not be okay with generating a whole essay with AI, what could cause a student to fully generate their essay? As a community, we must find strategies to prevent the malusage of Gen. AI and instead encourage usage that accelerates discovery, creation, production, and culture, as many responders in both categories said is possible.
