Throughout various departments at the University of Indianapolis and across the diverse workforce, the use of artificial intelligence is highly debated, regarding when, where and how it should be used.
Psychology
Associate Professor and Program Director of the Department of Psychological Sciences Katie Boucher said she believes AI usage should be carefully regulated but that it is important for faculty to have some flexibility in the way they utilize or restrict it. However, she said faculty should be careful and intentional about how AI is introduced in the classroom, and they should be clear regarding where the penalties for students using it lie.
Within the psychology department, Boucher said when a student seems to be inappropriately using AI for the first time, she and other faculty members make a point to sit down with that student to hear their intentions and how they used it. Instead of automatically labeling it “academic misconduct” and giving the student a zero, they should be allowed to understand the instructor’s unique philosophy around AI usage and a chance to explain themselves so that both parties can learn, according to Boucher. On the other hand, Boucher said a student simply using AI repeatedly as a crutch for everything prevents them from making mistakes, which are key to learning new material.
“We’re being very mindful of helping our students understand the unique implications of AI for psychology,” Boucher said. “There’s some [research] work coming out now that shows utilizing AI extensively means that you learn it less, and it is encoded less deeply in your memory. And so if it’s information you really need for grad school, professional school or for your job, you’re not learning it as much, depending on how you utilize AI.”
When it comes to using AI for therapy and counseling, Boucher said research is starting to show that AI is trained to see you as a client, simply wanting to please you and give you better answers. On the contrary, a therapist will push the client by asking follow-up questions about why they feel a certain way, and the therapist can detect nonverbal cues and when a client struggles with whether to self-disclose information, which Boucher said AI large language models cannot do.
Boucher said there are instances where AI chatbots can be very helpful, such as when a student is experiencing suicidal thoughts at 2 a.m. However, she said there needs to be safeguards that the AI will not accidentally give out information that would further the self-harm.
“If we have, in those moments, something that could be very scripted and utilize the power of AI, that’s awesome, but once the person has been connected to a therapy resource, what parts of this need to be human?” Boucher said. “What parts of this need to be engaged with an individual who has more training that can spot nonverbal cues that would be very hard for an AI program to do?”
Some additional ways Boucher said AI usage could be helpful are for writing out routine documents for the mass amounts of paperwork for clients, for constructing qualitative research and it allows quick accessibility for documents. Yet, she mentioned that the protection of that information, originally meant to be “confidential,” is unclear where it goes when it is written into AI.
Communication
Assistant Professor of Communication, Media Program Director and General Manager of UINDY-TV and WICR 88.7, Rick Dunkle, said there is no way we cannot embrace AI because the new generation will be dealing with it for the rest of their lives. Nevertheless, Dunkle said there is a time and a place for using it.
“We’re not going to pretend that AI doesn’t exist,” Dunkle said. “I don’t want students to use it for any of their final work, but to pretend that it’s not a fantastic search engine and can’t help you brainstorm, is disingenuous… We’re going to need students to know how to use AI effectively before they go out into the workforce because their employers are going to expect them to know how to use it well.”
Work should never be turned in that has been entirely generated by AI, but it is useful for brainstorming headlines and writing examples, according to Dunkle. Although he said he will never let AI be the “final writer of something.”
Dunkle said he does not care whether or not a student uses AI in the brainstorming process, but they cannot pass it off as their own work. Students should always identify when they have used AI and double-check it for accuracy, according to Dunkle.
As a child of the 1980s Terminator generation, Dunkle said he grew up with the fear of AI and saw the evils early on. People then saw that automation would take over certain jobs, according to Dunkle, and the creative industry never thought it would match their level. But in spite of that, Dunkle said people have trained AI with previous creative works by submitting old television shows and having it write new episodes.
“That’s cheating, and why the WGA [Writers Guild of America] was up in arms,” Dunkle said. “That’s why they struck because they recognize that now you’re taking IP [intellectual property] that has been created and owned by other people and using it to train AI. You’ve got to remember, AI is not thinking for itself. It’s mimicking itself. It’s taking previous work, figuring out how that was made, and then basically running it through its own algorithm to generate its new thing, which is just a rehash of all that it’s absorbed and spitting out a version that it thinks you will like. That’s not being creative.”
Engineering
Associate Dean and Director of the R.B. Annis School of Engineering Ken Reid said simply putting questions into ChatGPT is very easy right now, but it does not serve you well as a student. However, Reid emphasized how AI is useful for efficiency purposes, such as writing lab reports to go back and analyze, critique and correct, and as a research tool. UIndy’s Department of Engineering has three majors that directly relate to AI, which are Software Engineering, Computer Engineering and Computer Science, according to Reid.
“When you’re first learning computer programming, for instance, you do need to know how to write computer programs,” Reid said. “So don’t use AI to write your first few programs, because eventually you’re not going to be able to write anything… But for a seasoned programmer, if you need a function or a routine to do something, and you have AI generate that… it could be more efficient.”
Reid used the analogy of when calculators first came into schools, and students were told not to use them to learn math. Now, students use calculators to do the math they know how to do, according to Reid, to more efficiently solve bigger problems at hand.
Reid said there is a nationwide drop in interest in computer science and software engineering, which he finds surprising. The reason people give is that they think AI will take jobs, but somebody has to incorporate AI into computer systems, according to Reid. He is optimistic that the demand for these jobs will increase as AI develops.
“In computer science, we saw a big drop a couple of years ago when a lot of
the bigger Meta and Microsoft companies did some bigger layoffs,” Reid said. “I think that was probably the industry correction, and now we’re at a level where we’re still seeing a demand for jobs.”
Assistant Professor of Computer Science and Software Engineering Hung-Fu (Aaron) Chang said AI is used as a learning assistant and brainstorming tool for students, especially for project-based learning within the department’s “DesignSpine” courses. Chang said when using AI, it is essential to have previous fundamental knowledge of the subject matter to ask more specific, detailed and directed questions, which leads to more well-rounded answers.
When someone uses AI to give them a direct answer without any thought, that is the worst way to use it, according to Chang. He said looking at someone to learn how to ride a bicycle and actually hopping on it to ride it yourself are two completely different things.
“The large language model is a machine that has all the previous knowledge on the internet… but still not the future knowledge,” Chang said. “So the benefit of having the previous knowledge is you now know what’s going on right now, so you can improve, which drives future innovation.”
Finding the line between using AI ethically to improve and using it unethically, which results in a lack of knowledge and critical thinking, is a very tough challenge for every educator, according to Chang. To address this issue, in his Computer Science 101 programming courses, Chang said it is obvious when students try to get help from AI because it often gives more information than is needed. He said he makes a point to talk with students who use it incorrectly, teaching them where AI is right and wrong and where it has gone beyond the purpose of the assignment and subject matter, teaching them where discernment, knowledge and critical thinking are needed.
Another way in which Chang allows his students to use AI is within upper 300 and 400 level courses, such as Computer Science 310 called “User Interface and Game Development.” Chang said students in this course build upon their previous knowledge by creating a game, using AI to write their own programs and implement instructions according to specifications.
Chang complemented Reid’s optimistic view of the future job force by saying that as AI continues to change and develop, so does the industry. Chang acknowledged that right now is a tough time for graduating seniors going into the job force, but as people learn more about AI and how to adapt it in new settings, the job force will rebound and new career opportunities will come about.
English
Associate Professor of English Barney Haney said that within the English department, there are a variety of ideas and thoughts about AI usage. However, he said students are not allowed to use it at all in his creative writing and first-year seminar courses.
“If AI is doing the reading, critical thinking and writing for students, they have learned nothing,” Haney said. “All I’ve done is collected a paycheck.”
If a student uses AI all the way through their time at UIndy, at the end of the day, all they have is a fraudulent piece of paper that says “UIndy” on it, according to Haney. He said not only has that student wasted their time and money at UIndy, but they have also harmed the reputation of everyone else who has that degree.
Haney furthered this idea by using the analogy of someone graduating with a fraudulent piece of paper, stating, “Train Conductor.” If a company in need of conductors approached that student and told them to hop up in the train and drive it, they would automatically see that the student has no idea what they are doing when they do not know where to begin.
“If one of our goals at this university is learning to serve, then we’re failing ourselves and our communities when we present a fraudulent front out there,” Haney said. “The other ethical issue is that all that data that was fed into ChatGPT and the other large language models was stolen. They took all these authors’ books… and a vast amount of stuff, and just stole it. It was all copyrighted… If you and I stole like that, we would be in jail big time.”
Haney said he is concerned about AI “scooping up” professors’ intellectual property and teaching materials. This would result in the loss of their jobs and allow universities to keep those professors’ salaries in their pockets, according to Haney.
This year, Haney said he has been teaching “low tech, no tech,” meaning hardly any technology in the classroom and writing everything out by hand, except for essays and discussion posts on Brightspace. He said it has been much better, as the students know each other’s names, are less distracted and can have more face-to-face conversations.
“Distractions make challenges harder, but when we eliminate them and build a strong community around shared challenges, we become stronger together,” Haney said. “Our understanding grows, we feel less isolated and collaboration lightens the burden, showing us that working together is not only possible beyond the classroom, but necessary.”
