BU Today: Student-Designed Policy on Use of Generative AI Adopted by CDS Faculty
Expert philosopher and ethicist, Wesley Wildman, discusses the ethical use of artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT during a classroom project addressing how students can use it and how faculty should grade.
Excerpt from BU Today: News, Opinion, Community
By Joel Brown
Back in January, when ChatGPT started making news as the artificial intelligence tool of the future, Wesley Wildman tore up his lesson plan and instead assigned his undergraduate students in Data, Society and Ethics to write a policy for responsible use of generative AI programs in the classroom.
Only a few weeks later, the Faculty of Computing & Data Sciences has adopted that class project as the department’s official policy.
“It’s from the first week of the first BU course on the ethics of computing and data sciences, in our first semester in the new building,” says Azer Bestavros, BU’s inaugural associate provost for computing and data sciences. “I could not have written a better script.”
Wildman is a professor of philosophy, theology, and ethics and of computing and data sciences, who splits his time between the School of Theology and the Faculty of Computing & Data Sciences. The 47 students in his class planned to abide by their Generative AI Assistance (GAIA) Policy themselves and thought it might serve as a starting point for others around campus. But they didn’t think it would become CDS policy so soon after they started working on it.