Responding to AI in the classroom: Challenges, innovations, and strategies

There is no denying that AI has radically transformed higher education in the past few years. In recognition of this emerging phenomenon, SFU's Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences organized a teaching symposium early this year centred on this topic. Led by FASS Teaching Fellow Carman Fung, Responding to AI in the Classroom brought over eighty educators from across the university together to collectively work through the challenges and opportunities created by AI. 

Presentations covered topics ranges from confronting the ethics of AI, to innovating with AI in teaching and learning. Jason Brown’s (Global Humanities) presentation reflects on the need for educators to move beyond a myopic focus on individual cases of academic dishonesty and towards instilling in learners a compelling desire to adhere to higher ethical standard of academic integrity. Approaching ethical use of AI in society more broadly, Avni Kapoor and Margaret Grant (Linguistics and Cognitive Science) developed a digital learning tool to help students learn more about how data influences AI’s hallucinations and bias, while Nicholas Scott (Sociology and Anthropology) emphasized the importance to invite students to critically examine the ecological damages of AI use.

Many presenters experimented with involving AI in their teaching and assignments. English professors Leith Davis' and Nicky Didicher’s respective talks demonstrated how students can learn important critical writing skills from analyzing AI-generated content, while Carman Fung (Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s studies) similarly developed an online interactive Canvas module inviting students to closely read and critique AI-produced writing. In their presentation, Dionysios Arkadianos and Evan Freeman (Global Humanities) described how they asked students to use AI in a creative iconography assignment as a way to experiment with finding a middle ground between prohibiting and integrating AI use.

SFU educators are also experimenting with alternative assessment methods that replace or complement more traditional written essays: Jeremy Brown talked about the joy of switching to in-person book discussions as an evaluation method in his History courses, and Brenda Lyshaug (International Studies) experimented with a 'Marble Layer Cake' approach by breaking an assignment down to multiple smaller steps involving peer review and instructor feedback. 

The most valuable outcome of the symposium is the teaching community that it brought together. As one attendee expressed, hearing other educators’ concerns and experiences not only inspired them to try similar strategies, but also make them feel less alienated in facing today’s radically-changing education landscape.

The event also opened cross-unit and institutional-level conversations. Paul Kingsbury (SFU Vice-Provost and Associate Vice-President, Learning and Teaching) gave a presentation on the Senate-approved Learning & Teaching with Artificial Intelligence Guidelines and answered questions on creating unit-level AI policies and guidelines, while Arlette Stewart from SFU Student Services presented on the assessment procedurals of academic discipline cases. These dialogues are important for educators to respond to AI on a collective level.