

I don’t differentiate cheating from avoiding learning. Students get caught and fess up all the time, so it’s possibly even more pervasive than I believe.
I teach things like global political economy and ethnic studies. If a sizable portion of students are using generative AI to fudge their way through these topics, then we couldn’t be more fucked. We can only get more fascist from here.
And AI just compounds on other issues, like our political climate where people basically piss their pants because heaven forbid someone ask you to read 30 pages about enslavement. Not only do they not want to read but they are fairly often very racist and anti-intellectual. How do you address that when everything you can ask them to do to improve their engagement can be fudged?
In my experience this was more common 10+ years ago than it is today. Memorizing things temporarily can only get you so far. The problem is that grade inflation means you need to make an A or A+ or you just don’t get it at all. Getting a B means you are very mediocre and getting a C means you need to retake the course or explore a different field imo. If you are only really able to articulate that you understand 80% then you only know enough to be wrong in new creative ways.
I’m worried enough about good students falling into a state department trap, but these mediocre students will destroy us all one day.