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Comment by paulorlando | Hacker News Reader

Profs can push back on this if they want. Not all of them want to (or want to justify pushback given their pay).

For me when I teach, no laptops or phones in class along with in-class handwritten paper quizzes on course readings and concepts has helped a lot.

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Clearly not all of them want to do so. My son just finished up his freshman year at college. A couple months ago he called me and told me about an interaction he had with his English composition professor. She asked the class how they were integrating AI into their writing process. When she got to him, he said he didn't use AI, as he wanted to use the assignments to learn to write better. Her response was, "Well, you're probably too advanced for this class then." This is my son, who has a dysgraphia diagnosis, being told he is "too advanced" for freshman English class because he doesn't use AI to do his writing.

Sounds like a poor and offensive attempt at humor.

Yes. Sadly also sounds like something a lot of teachers would say. Or have said in my time, in a different context. But I wouldn't be surprised if things still haven't changed for the better.

Sounds like bitterness and resignation, to me.

That is fascinating to me. Especially in English composition. The flip side is if it's an adjunct prof making $4k per class (English typically pays poorly) then she's doing the hourly rate calculation and thinking that AI is going to help her with the students. So, a potential solution to this is for the universities to have the willingness to pay their professors and ask for no AI (at least in this type of class) in exchange.

Some ad junct professors may be making 5-10k per course. It’s basically lower than minimum wage. We can’t expect them to police students enthusiastically when they’re paid so lowly.

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