A big thank you to everyone who came along to our latest Reading Club on 8th May, it was great to see so many interested colleagues joining in our discussions – and a great and wide-ranging discussion in was! In this session we chatted about Constantine Manolchev, Ryan Nolan and Eleanor Hodgson’s opinion piece, Unlikely allies: ChatGPT and higher education assessment from Issue 30. We are also very happy to be joined by two of the authors, Constantine and Eleanor.
We opened proceedings by discussing an argument in the opinion piece that discussed parallels between intertextuality and GenAI, which caught a number of attendees’ attention. We discussed how intertextuality has been an underlying feature of literature studies and where/how tools like ChatGPT fit into these narratives and approaches. This also sparked some ideas around creativity and GenAI, as well as how other AI tools like Dall-E (AI-generated images) fit into this discussion.
We then moved on to the wider theme of the opinion-piece: assessment. The discussion started when the following question was posed to the group: “What are we trying to achieve with assessment – recall or creativity / problem-solving.” This sparked an interesting exchange that included the idea that GenAI has helped to speed up already existing debates on assessment changes in HE more widely and whether HEIs have created the conditions that encourage instrumental approaches to learning (with tools like ChatGPT being the path of least resistance to students’ degrees and/or ‘success’.
Lastly, the group shared ideas and values on the importance of writing to learn, and how ChatGPT fits into this – whether it helps or hinders this approach. We discussed how a balance can be achieved between GenAI helping a student or taking over for a student.
The next Reading Club will take place on Wednesday 10th July at 17:30.
Please book a free ticket via the JLDHE website. You will be notified in advance of the meeting with a selection of JLDHE articles for you to choose from. We will then confirm the piece with the most votes. The Zoom link, to access the meeting, is provided via your ticket.