Subject: AI Policy Update
Dear Colleagues,
As we begin the new school year, I would like to address the elephant in the room. Every semester, the situation becomes increasingly dire for us English Language Arts teachers.
It was just a few years ago that ChatGPT burst onto the scene, and suddenly, every other essay we saw began “taking a critical approach.”
I’ll never forget that first year. Little Vanessa, the president of the steering committee, stood at my desk, and with quivering hands extended her essay: A “critical examination” that used “a comparative approach to explore the intersection between friendship, eroticism, and jigsaw puzzling” in A Separate Piece.
And it’s gotten worse ever since. You’re exhausted. You feel stuck between a rock of having students handwrite their essays during class time, and a hard place of playing out KGB interrogation fantasies on wide-eyed 15-year-olds, guilty of submitting papers with a few too many “notables,” “delvings,” and “navigatings” of “landscapes.” I have great news:
I’ve written a policy document.
This document addresses each and every concern you might have about student AI use. Your questions about what to do when a paper doesn’t smell quite like a 14-year-old boy are now answered.
Take question 1:
Q: What do I do if my student admits to the use of ChatGPT or other forms of generative AI?
A: Ask them to what extent. Depending on the severity of its use, the student may be suspended, receive a failing grade, be asked to redo the assignment, or face a “minor penalty.” I think that clears up the ambiguity once and for all.
Or question 4:
Q: What do I do if I have suspicions that a student has used AI, but no proof?
A: Please consult the school’s policy at the link below. This link will take you to the school’s academic integrity page, which states that academic units are responsible for writing their own AI policies in line with the school’s educational philosophy and standards of academic integrity. This, in turn, will link you to the English departmental page, which will refer you to this document.”
Now, in the unlikely event that you come across a situation this document has not clearly foreseen and clarified, please read question 8.
Q: What do I do in a situation other than those outlined in this document, or if the answers given here do not successfully address the problem?
A: Although this question says a lot about your teaching competency, we are a team.
Please accompany the student to the department head’s office, where the interrogation will take place. It is in these cases that we will enact the interrogation fantasies that motivated us all to become educators in the first place.
You, the weakest of weak class teachers, will stand by my desk, arms at your sides. You are to answer: “That is correct, my director!” No matter what I ask you. I will address the student. I will sit. I will stand. I will slowly circle the accused, stroking his jaw, ever so softly with my pen, as we speak. I will show kindness, I will show mercy, I will show humanity, I will show despair.
The cheater will confess.
Please find the full document attached. It is only together, and most importantly, with this document that we can evolve and keep up with the pace of this ever-advancing, digital world, and win the war on AI.
I hope everyone has a good semester.
Michael McMillian (Mr. Mac)
B.A.; Department Head
Hi, I wrote an AI policy document for the staff in my department. Can you make it sound more professio…