Imagine being a 4.0 student for the first time in your life, in a doctoral program. You've recently changed schools because your previous school did not provide the support you needed. You are enrolled in your first class at the new school and have recently changed your program. Your first two assignments are due and since you are not new to writing skillfully, you are excited to submit your assignments and get your first two grades of the program. When you check your grades, you see two 0s and are told both of your papers show 80% plagiarized.
This was my experience this past week.
I'm a writer. I've always been one. In fact, I've been writing since I was about six years old. That's because my entire childhood was unlike many. My mom passed away when I was six and writing became a safe haven for me. When my father passed, ten short years later, the relationship I had with writing had grown stronger than ever.
I remember my 9th grade English teacher, Mrs. Jones-Meeks, giving us a portfolio assignment. It was for an entire school year of poems, short stories, and journaling. It was the same year my father passed, so mine was filled with stories of pain, tears, and my experiences from an adolescent persepctive. I never thought that one assignment would make me grow a passion for writing and literature overall.
Fast forward some years. I finished my bachelors in English, Masters in English and Creative Writing, Masters in Public Relations and landed my first-ever adjunct role as a professor of English. I strive daily to instill in my students the same passion I've carried my entire life, while sharing with them unique ways to connect with themselves as writers.
How I connect is through what I see.
For those of who are unfamiliar with who I am, I'm Takara M. Carter. I'm a long-time student, educator, and author. I am an Amazon bestselling author for my nonfiction works and themes such as Children of Alcoholics, Marriage and Divorce, and two of my recent and top sold projects: Atomic Marketing and Adjunct Like a Pro.
Aside from my nonfiction works, I am a well-known writer and ghostwriter. I enjoy writing crime thrillers with compelling detectives who have a knack for solving mysteries.
For my clients, I write a range of books, mostly nonfiction, SME, and even memoirs. I also have a very popular Writing Firm, Writluxe University, where my team and I provide tutoring, book writing consulting services, and much more.
This past weekend, I took a trip to Chicago, which happens to be my late father's birthplace. The experience was exhilarating. It was a solo trip (without my hubby) with my niece, and I spent the majority of my time capturing some of the best parts of the city.
Part of the reason for my PR degree was for the journalism aspect of it. Learning how to use my 4k Sony Camera and editing images was probably a small learning curve. I've always had a passion and an eye for photography, but editing was the hardest part. That was until I realized that editing is a form of storytelling. It is the ability to capture beautiful moments through photography.
So, after a rush of inspiration, I sat down Sunday, in a busy airport with my AirPods in, and wrote both of my school papers. They were only 3-4 pages in length, each. Something I can do in my sleep.
I was anxious to get my 100% A for both assignments, so when I checked my grades on yesterday, I was taken aback that I had received 0s and a request for a virtual meeting with my professor. There were two issues I realized in this moment:
- The impact of Accusations from Instructors.
- The long-term effects of these accusations from both the teacher & student.
So, this article is to open the discussion on this issue and have a real conversation.
The Impact of Accusations From Instructors
The interesting thing about this topic is that many of you connected here are likely instructors. Whether you teach secondary education or higher education, you are experienced with teaching, instructing and grading. As we all know, grading has become challenging in the last year, due to the significant rise of A.I. use among students and their assignments.
There aren't many ways we can avoid these issues, but here are a few things I've learned, after taking two trainings at two different schools, on how it all works:
- A.I. programs can answer questions on quizzes and tests.
- If your curriculum is based on anything before 2021, A.I. programs can provide answers and information about it.
- Using programs like Grammarly, ProWriting Aid, or even Scribbr, can cause significant A.I. percentages in papers.
- A.I. has its own language, once you've mastered the art of understanding and navigating through it, you can use it to its full potential.
Not every student knows how to truly navigate A.I. Truth is, you have to train it to be so efficient, that you can possibly get away with its use, without being detected. As someone who knows and understands this, I found it interesting that my paper was flagged 80% for A.I. use.
The problem was, I used ProWriting Aid to help with punctuation and grammar polishing. One of my weaknesses as a writer is that I over or under punctuate. I purchased the lifetime membership of this program November 20, 2019. At the time, this program did not have any improvisions in its benefits. It was to the point - use it to polish punctuation, suggest words to omit in your writing (we use "that" more often than you know), and other small suggestive changes. It wasn't the same as using Grammarly, which is why I rarely used the program.
What's more interesting is that some colleges either provide the premium to programs like Grammarly or encourage learners to use it. So, when a student is accused of using these programs, what is the real message we are sending?
As a English Professor, I realized a hard truth - students who take English classes as prerequisites to their programs, do not learn nearly as much as they should to be successful at writing. Writing and English are part of every profession you will ever consider, so why isn't there more time spent on English and writing?
Accusing students of using tools that are designed to help them improve their writing only complicates their academic experience. We are putting too much emphasis on the use of A.I., rather than showing our students how to appropriately use their tools.
The Long-Term Effects of A.I. Accusations on Educators and Students
I reached out to my popular network on Facebook, "Black Adjunct Professors," and got their ideas and feedback on accusations from both a learner and educator perspective. Naturally, as instructors themselves, many discussed how once a student has been accused of using A.I. it changes the dynamic of the relationship between the educator and the student.
On one end, the student may immediately feel unsupported. Not every professor will say things like "Student, the similarity score on your paper suggests that A.I. may have been used, do you mind walking me through your writing process..." Instead, it comes off as "You used 80% of A.I. in your paper which is completely unacceptable and will result in disciplinary actions according to the University's Plagiarism policy..."
Neither approach feels good on the receiving end, but it's the reality of how it happens. Now there is a barrier of trust between both parties. Honestly, this is how I felt. Now, I haven't spoken with my professor yet. This will happen later today, but I immediately felt bad about this. I wouldn't want my professor to assume, for the next six weeks, that I will be a problem student using A.I. I also don't want to feel like my future assignment grades will be graded harder because of the assumption that I'm using A.I.
Additionally, as a very strong writer, I do not want to feel like I have to "dumb-down" my writing so that it sounds less formal and more "personal." Again, I teach creative writing and it is clear that creative writing is not the same as formal academic writing. There is no use of personal pronouns, unless the instructor suggests it. Even when it is suggested, I do not like to use it. I prefer my work be written in 3rd person, to avoid the loss of points if there are too many personal pronouns in an academic paper.
What I've Learned
After sitting in the busy airport, filtering out the bustling noise of patrons boarding and unboarding planes, writing a paper, while listening to Pastor Mike Todd's Damaged But Not Destroyed, I felt confident in what I wrote. Plagiarism never crossed my mind. I've written hundreds of papers. I have a leading writing firm where I help students with their letter of intent to get acceptance into college. I recently tutored a student in Language Arts who's grade point increased from a D by 85%. Yet, two 0s quickly erased my confidence in my abilities.
A.I. is now built directly into Microsoft Word, a program that was released in 1983. With the click of a mouse, you can easily turn on certain features within word that help you recognize when you are using colloquialism, slang, or even cultural bias. Are these not considered as A.I. features? Are we that confident in our writing abilities that we can naturally correct our mistakes without the use of anything to help us "improve?" And more importantly, what is the message that we are sending our students, who stopped being taught spelling and grammar when they were in 3rd and 4th grade?
We need to figure out a solution for A.I. We will either have to adapt to the current trends in education and learning, or there will be several lawsuits as a result of accusations on A.I. use, from instructors who are using A.I. programs to determine plagiarism.
Want to check out more blogs like this? Stay in the know at www.takaramcarter.org
Also, check out my latest book, Adjunct Like a Pro, for all the helpful tips and advice on how to land a career in higher education teaching.
