Nigerian Students Turn to aI For Tests Answers, Lecturers Raise Alarm
Expert System (AI) is changing education while making learning more available but likewise stimulating disputes on its effect.
While students hail AI tools like ChatGPT for enhancing their learning experience, lecturers are raising issues about the growing dependence on AI, which they argue fosters laziness and undermines academic integrity, particularly with many trainees unable to defend their tasks or provided works.
Prof. Isaac Nwaogwugwu, a lecturer at the University of Lagos, in an interview with Nairametrics, fishtanklive.wiki expressed disappointment over the growing reliance on AI-generated responses amongst students stating a recent experience he had.
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"I offered an assignment to my MBA trainees, and out of over 100 trainees, about 40% submitted the specific same answers. These students did not even know each other, however they all utilized the exact same AI tool to create their responses," he stated.
He kept in mind that this trend is common among both undergraduate and postgraduate students but is particularly concerning in part-time and distance learning programs.
"AI is a severe challenge when it comes to tasks. Many students no longer believe critically-they just go on the internet, generate responses, and send," he included.
Surprisingly, some speakers are likewise accused of over-relying on AI, bphomesteading.com setting a cycle where both teachers and students turn to AI for archmageriseswiki.com convenience instead of intellectual rigor.
This debate raises critical questions about the role of AI in scholastic integrity and trainee advancement.
According to a UNESCO report, while ChatGPT reached 100 million monthly active users in January 2023, just one nation had launched policies on generative AI as of July 2023.
Since December 2024, ChatGPT had over 300 million people utilizing the AI chatbot each week and 1 billion messages sent out every day all over the world.
Decline of scholastic rigor
University lecturers are progressively worried about students submitting AI-generated projects without truly comprehending the material.
Dr. Felix Echekoba, a lecturer at Nnamdi Azikiwe University, expressed his concerns to Nairametrics about trainees progressively relying on ChatGPT, just to have problem with answering basic concerns when checked.
"Many students copy from ChatGPT and submit refined tasks, however when asked basic questions, they go blank. It's frustrating since education has to do with learning, not simply passing courses," he said.
- Prof. Nwaogwugwu explained that the increasing variety of first-class graduates can not be entirely credited to AI however admitted that even high-performing students use these tools.
"A first-rate trainee is a top-notch trainee, AI or not, however that doesn't imply they don't cheat. The advantages of AI may be peripheral, however it is making trainees dependent and less analytical," he said.
- Another speaker, Dr. Ereke, from Ebonyi State University, raised a different concern that some lecturers themselves are guilty of the very same practice.
"It's not just students utilizing AI slackly. Some speakers, out of their own laziness, generate lesson notes, course lays out, marking schemes, and even exam concerns with AI without evaluating them. Students in turn use AI to create answers. It's a cycle of laziness and it is eliminating real knowing," he regreted.
Students' perspectives on use
Students, on the other hand, say AI has actually improved their knowing experience by making academic materials more easy to understand and available.
- Eniola Arowosafe, a 300-level Business Administration trainee at Unilag, shared how AI has actually significantly helped her knowing by breaking down complex terms and providing summaries of prolonged texts.
"AI assisted me comprehend things more quickly, specifically when dealing with intricate subjects," she explained.
However, she remembered a circumstances when she utilized AI to send her task, just for bbarlock.com her lecturer to immediately acknowledge that it was produced by ChatGPT and reject it. Eniola kept in mind that it was a good-bad result.
- Bryan Okwuba, who recently finished with a first-rate degree in Pharmacy Technology from the University of Lagos, securely believes that his scholastic success wasn't due to any AI tool. He attributes his exceptional grades to actively engaging by asking concerns and concentrating on locations that lecturers stress in class, as they are often shown in test concerns.
"It's everything about existing, taking note, and taking advantage of the wealth of knowledge shared by my colleagues," he said,
- Tunde Awoshita, a final-year marketing student at UNIZIK, confesses to periodically copying straight from ChatGPT when facing numerous deadlines.
"To be sincere, there are times I copy directly from ChatGPT when I have numerous deadlines, and I know I'm guilty of that, most times the speakers don't get to read through them, but AI has likewise assisted me discover quicker."
Balancing AI's function in education
Experts believe the solution lies in AI literacy; and wiki.rolandradio.net lecturers how to use AI as a knowing aid instead of a shortcut.
- Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, highlighted the integration of AI into Nigeria's education system, stressing the value of a balanced approach that preserves human involvement while harnessing AI to improve learning outcomes.
"As we browse the rapidly progressing landscape of Expert system (AI), it is important that we prioritise human agency in education. We should guarantee that AI boosts, instead of replaces, educators' vital role in shaping young minds," he stated
Concerns over AI in Learning
Dorcas Akintade, a cybersecurity change expert, dealt with growing concerns regarding making use of expert system (AI) tools such as ChatGPT and their prospective risks to the academic system.
- She acknowledged the benefits of AI, nevertheless, highlighted the need for care in its usage.
- Akintade highlighted the increasing hesitance among teachers and schools toward including AI tools in learning environments. She determined 2 main reasons that AI tools are prevented in academic settings: security threats and plagiarism. She described that AI tools like ChatGPT are trained to react based on user interactions, which might not line up with the expectations of teachers.
"It is not looking at it as a tutor," Akintade stated, explaining that AI doesn't accommodate specific teaching methods.
Plagiarism is another problem, as AI pulls from existing data, frequently without proper attribution
"A great deal of individuals need to understand, like I stated, this is information that has been trained on. It is not simply bringing things out from the sky. It's bringing info that some other individuals are fed into it, which in essence suggests that is another person's documentation," she warned.
- Additionally, Akintade highlighted an early concern in AI advancement referred to as "hallucination," where AI tools would generate information that was not accurate.
"Hallucination implied that it was highlighting details from the air. If ChatGPT could not get that info from you, it was going to make one up," she explained.
She advised "grounding" AI by offering it with particular details to prevent such mistakes.
Navigating AI in Education
Akintade argued that prohibiting AI tools outright is not the option, particularly when AI presents an opportunity to leapfrog conventional instructional methods.
- She thinks that consistently strengthening key information assists people remember and prevent making mistakes when faced with difficulties.
"Immersion brings conversion. When you inform individuals the same thing over and over once again, when they are about to make the errors, then they'll remember."
She also empasized the need for clear policies and procedures within schools, noting that lots of schools must attend to individuals and process aspects of this usage.
- Prof. Nwaogwugwu has turned to in-class projects and tests to counter AI-driven academic dishonesty.
"Now, I mainly use tasks to make sure students supply original work." However, he acknowledged that managing large classes makes this approach hard.
"If you set intricate questions, students won't be able to utilize AI to get direct answers," he discussed.
He highlighted the need for universities to train lecturers on crafting exam questions that AI can not quickly resolve while acknowledging that some lecturers battle to counter AI misuse due to a lack of technological awareness. "Some lecturers are analogue," he said.
- Nigeria launched a draft National AI Strategy in August 2024, concentrating on ethical AI development with fairness, thatswhathappened.wiki transparency, responsibility, and personal privacy at its core.
- UNESCO in a report requires the regulation of AI in education, encouraging organizations to audit algorithms, data, and outputs of generative AI tools to guarantee they meet ethical requirements, safeguard user information, and filter unsuitable content.
- It worries the requirement to evaluate the long-lasting effect of AI on vital skills like thinking and imagination while producing policies that align with ethical structures. Additionally, UNESCO advises implementing age restrictions for online-learning-initiative.org GenAI use to secure younger students and protect vulnerable groups.
- For federal governments, it advised adopting a collaborated nationwide approach to managing GenAI, consisting of developing oversight bodies and aligning policies with existing data protection and privacy laws. It highlights evaluating AI risks, imposing stricter rules for high-risk applications, and making sure national information ownership.