Can ChatGPT Be Used to Cheat?

In his university teaching days, Mark Schneider watched as his students’ research sources moved from the library to Wikipedia to Google. With greater access to online information, cheating and plagiarism became easier. So Schneider, who taught at State University of New York, Stony Brook for 30 years, crafted essay prompts in ways that he hoped would deter copy-paste responses. Even then, he once received a student essay with a bill from a paper-writing company stapled to the back. But that’s nothing compared to what ChatGPT can do.

Teachers spend too much time trying to thwart students who are able to cheat in creative ways, and many educators are alarmed that ChatGPT, a new and widely available artificial intelligence (AI) model developed by OpenAI, offers yet another way for students to sidestep assignments. ChatGPT uses machine learning and large language modeling to produce convincingly human-like writing, and because users can input prompts or questions into ChatGPT and get paragraphs of text, it has become a popular way for students to complete essays and research papers. Some schools have already banned ChatGPT for students, but the same time, some educators are exploring ways to harness the tool for learning.

ChatGPT produces essays that are grammatically correct and free of spelling errors in a matter of seconds; however, its information isn’t always factual. ChatGPT provides answers that draw from webpages that may be biased, outdated or incorrect. Schneider described ChatGPT’s output as “semi reliable.” It has been shown to produce plausible references that are inaccurate and supply convincing answers that are not rooted in science.

“So when people get lazy and [say], ‘Hey, write this thing for me,’ and then take it and use it, there could be errors in it,” said Schneider. This makes it a valuable tool for generating ideas and writing rough drafts, but a risky option when using it for final assignments. Students who decide to use ChatGPT will likely need to double check that the information it provides is correct either by knowing the information in the first place or confirming with other dependable sources.

Because students can input original prompts into ChatGPT and get unique answers, it raises the question: Is using ChatGPT plagiarism? And how much does AI-generated text need to be edited until it is considered a students’ own work? In lieu of answering these questions, some schools, including districts in Los Angeles, New York City and Seattle, have opted to ban use of ChatGPT outright.

Schneider concedes that it makes sense for schools and teachers to hold ChatGPT at bay for the rest of the school year so they can take the summer to figure out how to use it next year. For example, ChatGPT can be used to help students outline essays before they write a rough draft longhand. Other teachers have used ChatGPT to suggest classroom activities or generate test questions. Trying to ban it completely won’t work and it’s an innovation in education that teachers will eventually have to face, Schneider said. “Just like they had to face calculators and computers and laptops and iPhones.”

Allison Green
Boston Tutoring Services