The increased use of AI presents a unique issue to education. On one hand AI can be used to cheat, putting answers at students’ fingertips, which allows them to forgo learning and instead throw homework problems into ChatGPT. However AI can also be used to supplement learning, pulling from a large database of prompts and research to provide quick explanations to students struggling to understand complex topics. Additionally, considering the frighteningly rapid advance of AI tools, it seems likely that the use of AI will become a core part of almost any real word job. This necessitates the incorporation of AI into education to equip students for ethical use of these tools in their future careers.
Unfortunately, however, it seems that almost all (UH Manoa) classes forbid the use of AI. This is unfortunate, because it is one unrealistic (students will still use AI, whether or not instructors want them too), and second because it implies the use of AI as inherently unethical and fails to provide an education to students for how to use these powerful tools properly. For this reason, I was quite interested when Software Engineering at UH Manoa, flipped the script, encouraging the use of AI as long as the use is documented. In this essay I will outline my limited use of AI tools, specifically ChatGPT, in this Software Engineering class and analyze what I believe this illuminates about AI tools.
I have used AI in class this semester in the following areas:
Experience WODs e.g. E18
I only utilized AI in experience WODs in a very limited manner; such as when I had to configure new packages on my computer, such as Meteor. I found it to be helpful for proper use of the command prompt. A common use of this is when I would put a command prompt error into ChatGPT, explaining what I was trying to do and it would tell me how to fix it (such as installing and saving dependencies I needed).
In-class Practice WODs
I did not use AI tools in either Practice WODs or In-class WODs. The reason for this is that I did not want to rely on them to complete the tasks. The WODs asked for fairly simple software and algorithm designs and I wanted to make sure that I had the knowledge and skills to solve them without an AI writing code for me.
In-class WODs
I did not use AI. See question 2
Essays
For almost all of my essays I did not use AI. To me, AI generated writing seems fake, vague, unspecific, and ultimately not worth reading. However, for a Design Pattern essay I wanted to test out what AI could do and if I could mitigate these AI issues. So for this essay I provided ChatGPT with the prompt and a detailed outline of what I wanted the essay to be about. I’ve also wondered if I could give ChatGPT some of my previously written essays and tell it to write in my voice. I did this but the ChatGPT did not really seem to understand what I was attempting to do.
The first draft of the essay sounded like it was written by AI. I had to do a fair amount of additional prompting to simplify the wording and remove phrases that seemed especially generated. I also had to fix up some of my examples as ChatGPT did not quite comprehend how they fit into the topic purely based off my outline. In the end, I thought the essay was okay. However, it seems to me that where the essay stepped in and simplified my writing experience, it did so in a way that does not at all reflect my writing style and is bland and un-organic.
Final project
I did not use AI for the final project. If I lacked understanding I chose to go to a more experienced developer on my team for help instead.
Learning a concept / tutorial
I did not use AI in this way
Answering a question in class or in Discord
I did this sometimes, but I tend to stick to a resource I’m more familiar with, such as GeeksForGeeks. However, for conceptual ideas it seemed that AIs, such as ChatGPT were usually correct and moderately insightful for software issues.
Asking or answering a smart-question
I did not use AI in this way
Coding example e.g. “give an example of using Underscore .pluck”
I did not use AI in this way, opting to look at documentation or other online resources instead
Explaining code
I did not use AI in this way
Writing code
I did not use AI in this way. See question 2
Documenting code
I did not use AI in this way
Quality assurance
I did not use AI in this way
Other uses in ICS 314 not listed above
Help with command prompt. See question 1
I do not think that AI helped me much in learning for my Software Engineering class. However, this is primarily due to the fact that I did not use it often to supplement my learning. I believe this is partly because I fall into the common pitfall which views AI as only a tool to give you the immediate solution to a problem. I like to work through problems to gain an understanding of the issue and I have a stigma (which I am trying to break) that AI can not help in this manner.
In the limited use of AI I have done in my Software Engineering class, I have found it to be a useful tool. From what I’ve seen, AI will certainly become quickly ingrained in software engineering fields in the future. Especially with software-engineering-focused AIs being developed, such as Devin, the need to utilize AI is paramount for those going into the tech field.
AI has limitations. The technology, while quickly advancing, can not do everything one would hope it could. I often find that ChatGPT does not understand exactly what you want it to do, and seems unable to accomplish certain tasks, such as writing an essay in my voice. Prompting an AI can be difficult as it is unclear what its knowledge database contains. Humans can make connections in their brain, read body language, understand inflection, etc; coding languages have clear syntax. AI lack either of these and that makes it (at least to me) difficult to know how to efficiently use it.
Is education better with or without AI? This question does not have an easy answer. It is true that in an academic setting, AI can easily become a crutch rather than a tool. The dangerous mindset that AI will do your homework and learning for you can be exploited. It was likely possible in this class to write entirely AI generated essays and get points for minimal effort. This is a clear hindrance to education when utilized in a lazy way.
On the other hand using AI to learn how to properly interface new commands or frameworks can be extremely helpful and efficient. However, with anything that provides a simple answer that can be copy and pasted, there is the temptation to put a solution rather than a to understand a solution. People will always cut corners and AI can facilitate these bad practices.
I liked that the Software Engineering class was open in facilitating usage and discussion of AI. I think that moving forward, there should be course material specifically designed to address smart and ethical AI prompting. Also, building a resource of how AI can be efficiently used (such as one built off the information provided by people in the class) will be quite helpful if the material is analyzed and succinctly explained.
Using AI in software engineering has proved to be quite interesting, even though I generally chose to rely on other resources to provide my education. It definitely made me question my predisposed ideas about what AI can and should be used for. Like it or not, AI is here to stay, especially in the tech world. For this reason its use should be spread throughout academic settings. However, it should not just be allowed but rather taught and facilitated.
I put the entire essay into ChatGPT and asked it to list spelling and grammar errors. I then looked at what it flagged and either implemented its recommendation or made a different modification I liked better.