AI and Teaching

That I hate AI with the heat of a thousand suns is something I assume everyone knows. I am now the head of a small institute on campus (more on this later, I will have access to cool lectures that you can sign up to watch on the internet that we are hosting!). One thing I want to do as head of this is to enter conversations with the donors (I grant you this entire idea is hilarious). My general plan is what works here at LGM–if you berate people, they tend to give money. And if it doesn’t work, well I hate the rich anyway so I already win by berating them. Anyway, I was in a meeting with a person on campus about all this and said person sent me something and said “this is a start, AI can help you make it better.” I responded–and this is a direct quote: “AI is Satan Incarnate. I will use my brain.”

You don’t want me sending emails like this, don’t put me in charge of things. My superpower is not giving a fuck if you like me, so if I get this taken away from me, what’s the downside? Oh no, I have to go back to teaching another class a semester, something I truly love? Oh no!!!

Speaking of such things though, the semester is nigh upon us. I have been racking my brain on how to AI proof my class. That means the end of research papers. It means telling my students they are idiots for using AI (not that they are going to listen). It means using databases instead of generally online material for assignments since that stuff isn’t in AI systems (this may be a pipe dream). It means thinking a lot more about this than I used to.

So….what would you do to AI proof a History course? Or any other course. This is a thread for professors, sure. What are you doing? But also everyone else. All ideas are welcome in this time of horror and desperation!