GLCA Opportunity: Friday, November 15 (12:30-1:30 Eastern): Empowering Learning with Integrity in the Age of AI with Tricia Bertram Gallant, Director of Academic Integrity Office and Triton Testing Center at the University of California San Diego.
Are Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) tools a threat to academic integrity or an opportunity for us to evolve teaching, learning, and assessment? The answer is both, of course!
This session will focus on understanding the threats and opportunities and then identifying the options that faculty have for minimizing the threat and amplifying the opportunities of AI. In thinking about one thing we can do next week, next term and next year, participants will leave the session empowered to craft their GenAI and AI policy while creating a culture of integrity within their classes.
Tricia Bertram Gallant, Ph.D. is the Director of Academic Integrity Office and Triton Testing Center at the University of California San Diego (UCSD), Board Emeritus of the International Center for Academic Integrity, and former lecturer for both UCSD and the University of San Diego. Tricia has authored, co-authored, or edited numerous articles, blogs, guides, book chapters/sections, and books on academic integrity, artificial intelligence, and ethical decision-making. Most recently, Tricia authored Crafting Your GenAI & AI Policy: A Guide for Instructors. which has been shared widely within and beyond UCSD as a helpful tool for faculty struggling with the impact of artificial intelligence on teaching, learning and assessment. Tricia has a forthcoming book (University of Oklahoma Press, 2024), co-authored with David Rettinger, entitled “The Opposite of Cheating: Teaching for Integrity in the Age of AI. Tricia regularly consults with and trains faculty, staff and students around the world, on academic integrity, artificial intelligence, and ethical decision-making.
Sign up here for this online event (a Zoom link will be sent the day before). The session will be recorded.
Higher Education and The Election (CBS and NBC Exit Polling): https://www.cbsnews.com/elections/2024/united-states/president/exit-poll/
Education-Level Voting Gaps Are Highest Among Men, White People (Johanna Alonso, Inside Higher Ed, November 8, 2024): Overall, college graduates voted for Harris by 13 points more than they did Trump. But that gap was even starker for certain demographics.
The College-Degree Divide Is Becoming a Chasm (Declan Bradley, Chronicle of Higher Education, November 6, 2024): The gap between how college graduates and non-college graduates voted was even wider than the past two presidential elections, per exit polls — but the pattern is limited to white voters.
Teaching and Learning
Navigating Difficult Classroom Conversations (Tricia Shalka, Inside Higher Ed, November 8, 2024): Strategies for preparing for, and leading, classroom discussions in moments of crisis and discomfort.
Academic Freedom With and Without Academic Responsibility (Steven Mintz, Inside Higher Ed, November 8, 2024): Revitalizing the humanities by anchoring general education curricula in transformative texts and life’s most profound questions.
Curation, Collections, and Collaboration (Bonni, Stachowiak, Teaching in Higher Ed, November 7, 2024): Insights from UVA’s Teaching Hub (46-minute podcast).
Why Grade Inflation Is Spreading from High School to College – And How It Hurts Learning (Karin Klein, Los Angeles Times, November 5, 2024): A report by the National Center for Education Statistics found that although high school students were taking more credits and tougher courses and getting higher grades in math, their actual mastery of the material had declined.
Cheating Has Become Normal (Beth McMurtrie, Chronicle of Higher Education, November 4, 2024): Faculty members are overwhelmed, and the solutions aren’t clear.
In Time of Campus Turmoil, More Colleges Try Teaching Civil Discourse (Maggie Hicks, EdSurge, November 4, 2024): While it’s not yet clear how much difference a few training sessions or discussion events can make, organizers hope they will leave students better prepared to enter a world that has only become more polarized.
Redefining Assessment: Empowering Students through a Blended Approach (Abby L. Kalkstein and Justin L. Rheubert, Faculty Focus, November 4, 2024): Discusses blending formative and summative assessments to help students focus on what they need to focus on or advance in the content if they are ready.
Why Do We Need Inclusive Teaching if Everyone Learns in the Same Way? (Stephen L. Chew, The Teaching Professor, October 21, 2024): People assume that when we talk about learning, there is a single, best way to learn all subjects in all situations. Learning, however, is contextual. It arises from a complex interaction of multiple factors. (Thanks to Lew Ludwig for this article.)
All Things AI
EdTech and AI with Jared Cooney Horvath (Cindy Nebel, Learning Scientists, November 7, 2024): 40-min podcast of a discussion between Horvath, a neuroscientist and educator, and Cindy Nebel on how technology has impacted learning and how artificial intelligence may impact both learning and society moving forward.
Here Come the AI Agents! (Ray Schroeder, Inside Higher Ed, November 6, 2024): Anthropic last month took the lead in providing early access to basic AI agents for the masses. This is a huge leap forward from the chat bots that have dominated early generative AI.
The Year of Curiosity Podcast: from Carleton College, Jennifer Wolff, Director of the Perlman Center for Learning and Teaching, and George Cusack, Director of Writing Across the Curriculum, journey into the world of AI with guests from across the Carleton community and beyond. The latest guest is Melissa Eblen-Zayas, who shares some ways she’s been using AI to help students learn Physics and quantitative reasoning skills.
AI May Ruin the University as We Know It (Matthew Kirschenbaum and Rita Raley, Chronicle of Higher Education, October 31, 2024): The existential threat of the newest wave of ed-tech.
After the Election: Consequences for Higher Ed
After the Election: Breaking Shells, Bearing Light (Mays Imad, Inside Higher Ed, November 7, 2024): It’s not business as usual.
What Now? (John Warner, Inside Higher Ed, November 7, 2024): Don’t do the job. Do the work.
Anxiety and Speculation in Wake of Trump’s Win (Josh Moody, Inside Higher Ed, November 7, 2024): Lobbyists and higher education experts say the Education Department is unlikely to go but predict that Trump will end a number of Biden’s policies.
Work to Do After the Election (Michael Roth, Wesleyan University, November 6, 2024): We don’t have to pretend to be neutral, but we do have a job to do.
What Trump’s Victory Means for Higher Ed (Liam Knox, Inside Higher Ed, November 6, 2024): Donald Trump’s first term shone a political spotlight on higher ed that has only grown more glaring since. A second could bring more sweeping changes.
What Trump’s Threat of Mass Deportation Could Mean for Higher Ed (Karin Fischer, Chronicle of Higher Education, November 6, 2024): President-elect Donald J. Trump’s anti-immigrant stances and pledges have ratcheted up uncertainty and anxiety on college campuses, but experts and advocates cautioned against overreacting to the election outcome.
How Colleges Are Preparing for Election Day and Its Aftermath (Graham Vyse, Chronicle of Higher Education, November 4, 2024): As ever, colleges will have to balance the promotion of campus safety with the protection of free expression — an increasingly challenging task.
Republicans Could Abolish the Education Department. How Might That Work? (Katherine Knott, Inside Higher Ed, November 4, 2024): Trump and his allies want to dismantle the 45-year-old agency. But doing so would be more complicated than they say.
Trump and His Allies Are Preparing to Overhaul Higher Education (Steven Brint, Chronicle of Higher Education, March 6, 2024): The sector isn’t prepared to defend itself.
Affirmative Action and DEI
How the End of Affirmative Action Is Affecting Indigenous Students (Sara Weissman, Inside Higher Ed, November 8, 2024): Native American student enrollments had already been falling for at least a decade. Last year’s Supreme Court ruling may be making matters worse.
Extra Credit Reading and Listening
Neutrality Is Meant to Be Broken (Agnes Callard, November 4, 2024): The current debates about institutional speech miss the point.
Professors Are Uniquely Powerful. That May Be Changing (Alan Blinder, New York Times, November 2, 2024): Faculty members are used to sharing power with presidents and trustees to run universities. But some presidents and lawmakers have made moves to reduce their say.
Jonathan Haidt Started a Social-Media War. Did He Win? (Stephanie M. Lee, Chronicle of Higher Education, November 1, 2024): When a study challenged his bestselling book’s thesis — that social media harms kids — the New York University psychologist fired back. That was just the beginning.
Future Imperfect
Black Students Receive Racist Texts Postelection (Josh Moody, Inside Higher Ed, November 8, 2024): The message told recipients that they had been “selected to pick cotton at the nearest plantation.”
Demonstrators Spark Counter-Protest of Hundreds at TXST [Texas State] (Lucciana Choueiry, Blake Leschber, and Marisa Nuñez, The University Star, November 6, 2024): Students confront signs proclaiming: “Types of Property: Women, Slaves, Animals, Cars, Land, Etc.”
Legal Team With Ties to Trump Investigating NSF’s ‘Leftist Ideology’ (Kathryn Palmer, Inside Higher Ed, November 7, 2024): America First Legal Foundation, a nonprofit run by former members of President-elect Donald Trump’s first administration, is suing the National Science Foundation for records related to the agency’s prioritization of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
On the Bookshelf
Thriving at Small Colleges and Small Centers: A Centers for Teaching and Learning Guidebook (Tracie Addy, Lew Ludwig, and Chris Hakala for the POD Small Colleges and Small Centers network, October 2024). A new, open resource for faculty engaged in teaching and learning centers.
Conferences and Workshops
How AI May Change Student Engagement (November 13, 2:00 Eastern, Chronicle of Higher Education): How is AI transforming higher-ed practices? In this virtual forum, a panel of experts will discuss concerns about these fast-evolving technologies and findings from The Chronicle’s recent survey on AI in higher education. Register here.
Have a short article or some news related to teaching and learning at your institution that you’d like to share with colleagues? Send your contribution along to us. Also, please email Colleen Monahan Smith (smith@glca.org) if you have colleagues who would like to receive this weekly report.
Steven Volk (steven.volk@oberlin.edu), Editor
GLCA/GLAA Consortium for Teaching and Learning
Co-Directors:
Lew Ludwig (ludwigl@denison.edu)
Colleen Monahan Smith (smith@glca.org)