Every time students are given a reading or writing assignment, they decide whether to use AI. Every single time. So, there is no hiding from this tool (or really set of tools).
My AI policy, which I’ve adapted from suggestions by researchers and teachers in the field of Rhetoric and Composition, and by attending workshops (in-person and on line) on teaching with AI, follows the best practices at the top universities in the United States. I have been particularly influenced by Dr. Annette Vee, Professor English at the University of Pittsburgh, whose blog I follow. I secured the funding and invited her to give two workshops and public lecture on AI and writing in the Spring 2025. What I have learned from her and other researchers in the field is that LLM can be used to assist students in all aspects of reading and writing but it's a “wild west” of shortcuts/cheating unless teachers train students in, and engage them in conversation about, the limits and ramifications of the tools. This is not a one-and-done type deal; it must be rolled out over the semester and it requires, for those students who choose to ignore the policies and nuances, a protocol (including personal conferences) for dealing with violations. I am learning more about how to do this without it being a tug-of-war of did-you-do-it?, which it can easily become.
But the struggle is worth it, primarily because advanced literacy equips writers with a way of communicating not only facts and ideas but also a version of their public-facing self: a persona, a "voice." In a recent article for the New Yorker Magazine, Hua Hsu makes this very point:
Why bother teaching writing now? The future of the midterm essay may be a quaint worry compared with larger questions about the ramifications of artificial intelligence, such as its effect on the environment, or the automation of jobs. And yet has there ever been a time in human history when writing was so important to the average person? E-mails, texts, social-media posts, angry missives in comments sections, customer-service chats—let alone one’s actual work. The way we write shapes our thinking. We process the world through the composition of text dozens of times a day, in what the literary scholar Deborah Brandt calls our era of “mass writing.” It’s possible that the ability to write original and interesting sentences will become only more important in a future where everyone has access to the same A.I. assistants (My emphasis, "Annals of Education," June 30, 2025)