Nigerian Students Turn to aI For Tests Answers, Lecturers Raise Alarm
Expert System (AI) is changing education while making discovering more accessible however likewise stimulating arguments on its impact.
While students hail AI tools like ChatGPT for enhancing their knowing experience, speakers are raising concerns about the growing reliance on AI, which they argue fosters laziness and weakens scholastic integrity, especially with many students not able to safeguard their assignments or given works.
Prof. Isaac Nwaogwugwu, a lecturer at the University of Lagos, in an interview with Nairametrics, revealed aggravation over the growing reliance on AI-generated actions among students recounting a current experience he had.
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"I provided a project to my MBA students, and out of over 100 students, about 40% submitted the specific very same responses. These students did not even know each other, but they all used the very same AI tool to produce their responses," he stated.
He noted that this trend is common amongst both undergraduate and postgraduate students however is specifically worrying in part-time and range learning programs.
"AI is a major obstacle when it comes to projects. Many trainees no longer believe critically-they simply go online, produce responses, and submit," he included.
Surprisingly, some lecturers are also accused of over-relying on AI, setting a cycle where both teachers and trainees turn to AI for benefit instead of intellectual rigor.
This argument raises crucial concerns about the function of AI in academic integrity and student development.
According to a UNESCO report, while ChatGPT reached 100 million monthly active users in January 2023, only one country had actually launched policies on generative AI since July 2023.
As of December 2024, ChatGPT had over 300 million people using the AI chatbot every week and 1 billion messages sent out every day around the globe.
Decline of scholastic rigor
University lecturers are significantly worried about students submitting AI-generated projects without really comprehending the content.
Dr. Felix Echekoba, a speaker at Nnamdi Azikiwe University, expressed his issues to Nairametrics about students significantly counting on ChatGPT, just to fight with addressing fundamental concerns when checked.
"Many trainees copy from ChatGPT and send sleek assignments, but when asked standard questions, they go blank. It's disappointing because education has to do with learning, not just passing courses," he stated.
- Prof. Nwaogwugwu explained that the increasing variety of first-class graduates can not be completely associated to AI but confessed that even high-performing students use these tools.
"A first-rate student is a first-rate trainee, AI or not, however that does not suggest they do not cheat. The advantages of AI may be peripheral, but it is making trainees dependent and less analytical," he stated.
- Another speaker, Dr. Ereke, from Ebonyi State University, raised a different concern that some speakers themselves are guilty of the exact same practice.
"It's not just trainees utilizing AI lazily. Some speakers, out of their own laziness, generate lesson notes, course details, marking plans, and even examination concerns with AI without examining them. Students in turn utilize AI to create responses. It's a cycle of laziness and it is killing real knowing," he regreted.
Students' viewpoints on usage
Students, on the other hand, say AI has actually improved their knowing experience by making scholastic products more understandable and available.
- Eniola Arowosafe, a 300-level Business Administration trainee at Unilag, shared how AI has considerably helped her knowing by breaking down complex terms and supplying summaries of lengthy texts.
"AI helped me understand things more quickly, particularly when handling complicated subjects," she described.
However, she recalled a circumstances when she utilized AI to submit her job, hikvisiondb.webcam only for her to immediately recognize that it was produced by ChatGPT and decline it. Eniola noted that it was a good-bad result.
- Bryan Okwuba, who recently finished with a superior degree in Pharmacy Technology from the University of Lagos, securely believes that his academic success wasn't due to any AI tool. He associates his exceptional grades to actively engaging by asking questions and focusing on areas that lecturers highlight in class, as they are often shown in examination concerns.
"It's everything about being present, focusing, and tapping into the wealth of understanding shared by my coworkers," he said,
- Tunde Awoshita, a final-year marketing trainee at UNIZIK, confesses to sometimes copying straight from ChatGPT when dealing with numerous due dates.
"To be truthful, there are times I copy straight from ChatGPT when I have numerous due dates, and I know I'm guilty of that, many times the speakers do not get to check out them, however AI has also assisted me find out faster."
Balancing AI's role in education
Experts think the solution lies in AI literacy; mentor trainees and speakers how to use AI as a learning help instead of a faster way.
- Minister of Education, grandtribunal.org Dr. Tunji Alausa, highlighted the integration of AI into Nigeria's education system, worrying the importance of a balanced method that maintains human involvement while harnessing AI to improve finding out results.
"As we browse the rapidly progressing landscape of Artificial Intelligence (AI), it is important that we prioritise human firm in education. We should guarantee that AI improves, rather than replaces, educators' vital function in shaping young minds," he stated
Concerns over AI in Learning
Dorcas Akintade, a cybersecurity improvement specialist, dealt with growing concerns regarding using synthetic intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT and their prospective risks to the educational system.
- She acknowledged the advantages of AI, nevertheless, stressed the requirement for caution in its usage.
- Akintade highlighted the increasing resistance among educators and schools toward incorporating AI tools in discovering environments. She identified two main reasons AI tools are discouraged in instructional settings: security threats and plagiarism. She described that AI tools like ChatGPT are trained to respond based on user interactions, which might not align with the expectations of educators.
"It is not looking at it as a tutor," Akintade stated, explaining that AI does not deal with specific mentor code.snapstream.com techniques.
Plagiarism is another problem, as AI pulls from existing data, frequently without appropriate attribution
"A great deal of people need to comprehend, like I said, this is information that has been trained on. It is not just bringing things out from the sky. It's bringing information that some other people are fed into it, which in essence means that is another person's documents," she cautioned.
- Additionally, Akintade highlighted an early concern in AI advancement referred to as "hallucination," where AI tools would generate information that was not accurate.
"Hallucination suggested that it was drawing out information from the air. If ChatGPT might not get that information from you, it was going to make one up," she discussed.
She recommended "grounding" AI by offering it with particular information to prevent such mistakes.
Navigating AI in Education
Akintade argued that prohibiting AI tools outright is not the service, especially when AI presents an opportunity to leapfrog conventional academic methods.
- She thinks that consistently strengthening crucial info helps individuals keep in mind and prevent making mistakes when confronted with challenges.
"Immersion brings conversion. When you tell people the same thing over and over once again, when they will make the errors, then they'll remember."
She also empasized the requirement for clear policies and treatments within schools, noting that lots of schools must resolve the people and process elements of this use.
- Prof. Nwaogwugwu has resorted to in-class projects and tests to counter AI-driven scholastic dishonesty.
"Now, I primarily use projects to guarantee students offer initial work." However, he acknowledged that managing big classes makes this method tough.
"If you set complicated concerns, trainees will not have the ability to use AI to get direct responses," he explained.
He stressed the need for universities to train lecturers on crafting examination concerns that AI can not quickly solve while acknowledging that some speakers struggle to counter AI abuse due to an absence of technological awareness. "Some speakers are analogue," he said.
- Nigeria released a draft National AI Strategy in August 2024, focusing on ethical AI development with fairness, transparency, responsibility, and privacy at its core.
- UNESCO in a report calls for the policy of AI in education, encouraging institutions to examine algorithms, data, and outputs of generative AI tools to guarantee they satisfy ethical standards, secure user information, and filter inappropriate content.
- It worries the need to evaluate the long-term effect of AI on important skills like believing and creativity while creating policies that align with ethical frameworks. Additionally, UNESCO recommends executing age restrictions for GenAI usage to secure younger trainees and protect vulnerable groups.
- For governments, it encouraged embracing a collaborated nationwide technique to managing GenAI, including developing oversight bodies and aligning guidelines with existing information security and privacy laws. It stresses examining AI risks, enforcing more stringent rules for high-risk applications, and making sure nationwide data ownership.