Should we be using AI powered tools in the academic environment?

Well, we no longer have to imagine it, since a number of students have started receiving failing grades and have even been accused of using either AI or committing plagiarism by Turnitin. 

Multiple university students have filed complaints after being redirected to the misconduct departments of their faculties after these plagiarism tools wrongly identified their work as AI.

It turns out that programs designed to help maintain academic integrity are actually failing to do so. 

@ryan_atkerson

#stitch with @Marley Stevens @Grammarly Marley was accused of cheating using AI to write her college paper; however, she simply used Grammarly, which her university RECOMMENDED on their official website. Turnitin is notorious for falsely flagging content as AI or plagiarism. The university must issue a formal apology and further refine its AI and academic dishonesty guidelines. Go check out her page for all the updates, but, as of now, the process remains ongoing. #fyp #foryoupage #grammarly #universityofnorthgeorgia #college #academic #angry #rant #scandal #turnitin #ai #aidetectors

♬ original sound – Marley Stevens

It has even been reported that the simple use of Grammarly to support punctuation and grammar will cause Turnitin to flag the use of AI in essay submissions.

In this case, it doesn’t matter if a student wrote the whole paper – the use of one tool to fix a typo could see them falsely accused of plagiarism or AI-generated work.

Other students have run their past papers written before ChatGPT and other AI tools were accessible. They, too, got a mark of 60 percent AI use.

@maggiesavannah1

#greenscreen i was wrongfully accused of using ai to write a final paper. what would you do in my situation? @Marley Stevens has a GREAT series on her profile about grammarly being flagged as ai and her advocacy against it. i will update yall when i know more 🩷 #ai #college #falselyaccused

♬ original sound – maggiesavannah1

The situation has become so serious that students have even been denied the opportunity to prove their innocence.

It’s a growing problem that is occurring in various institutions around the world, causing students to make YouTube videos explaining what to do if you are being falsely accused of using AI. 

More recently, students have created petition on change.org to stop these platforms from being able to use AI to call out academic misconduct.