AI & Your Learning

Student Responsibilities

Whatever your views on AI in education, you and other students have experienced the unprecedented effect of this continuously evolving technology. To ensure your authentic learning and success at MHCC and beyond, we recommend the following:

• Find your instructor’s policies on AI use and know that faculty standards vary from course to course
• Recognize your privacy and data security when using AI. The college recommends logging into Office 365 and using Copilot to protect your and the college’s data.
• Recognize the inherent biases, “hallucinations”, and other limitations of generative AI. Verify the accuracy and timeliness of AI content by cross-checking information.
• Always cite content obtained by AI. Follow this link for MHCC library resources on citing AI.
• Check in with instructors regularly to ensure your use of AI is allowed for specific assignments.

Benefits and Limitations of AI

Challenges of using generative AI

• Provides a mix of correct and incorrect information
• Has limited knowledge of very current events in the world (e.g. last week, last month, etc.)
• Can produce biased content - especially for controversial topics.
• Collects your data and may use it without your knowledge or authorization.
• May endanger your health, finances, or legal status with false information despite seeming correct
• Does not think or have consciousness

Benefits of using generative AI

• Provides simple explanations to well-known, non-controversial topics
• Creates effective summaries
• Creates useful lists of keywords, search terms
• Explains information in ways that are easy to understand
• Writes or debugs computing code
• Provides feedback on your ideas

Make Learning Easier by using Prompts

Prompts are questions that allow users to interact with generative AI. Learning to write useful prompts is a powerful skill that could help you succeed throughout your academic and professional life if you remember AI has knowledge, but no consciousness.

Tip: No matter how much it seems like it understands or thinks, large language models generate content from datasets available across the internet. That means they will draw from sites riddled with conspiracies, racist content, and misinformation. Apply your critical thinking skills when evaluating the results generated by your prompts.

Follow this link to a collection of prompts for different Gen AI tools. More Useful Things: AI Resources Student Exercises.