Building and Communicating AI Expectations and Instructions for Your Course: Why It Matters

AI Statement I:

“AI powered applications and online translation tools:

PLEASE READ! Please take note of the following information regarding the use of AI-powered applications and online translation tools in our class. We will be using language tools like ChatGPT or other AI language models to generate text. In our first week of classes, we’ll explore how we plan to integrate AI-powered technology into our course. Together, we’ll examine its capabilities as a tutor and a learning tool to enhance your learning outcomes and experience. 

While online AI- powered tools are publicly available, they often produce results that are less accurate, reliable, and may contain biases, stereotypes, and misleading information detrimental to your learning needs and current context. Please be aware that utilizing automatic translation aids or AI-powered tools in your written work without proper citation will result in a grade of zero, even if the assignment is grammatically correct. Your instructor will be able to identify the use of these tools.”  Letts-Piedrahita, D. L. (2025)

AI Statement II:

Lima Monteiro, A. (2025)

AI Statement III:

“Course Expectations Regarding AI Tools (1000 Level Course) 

Instructors Statement on AI Usage and Assessment

No AI Tools: The use of artificial intelligence tools in this course is prohibited. This includes any AI resources for writing or research to be graded towards the final grade. In-Class Assessment: All assessments will be conducted in class, the Testing Centre or the Accessible Learning Centre to ensure authentic engagement with the materials, tasks and with the support of the instructor, teaching assistant, accessibility or proctoring support. All in agreement with the University of Lethbridge Student Code of Conduct & the Assessment of Student Policy at the University of Lethbridge. 

These expectations aim to strengthen students’ writing and critical thinking skills. By prohibiting AI assistance, students will develop their ability to articulate ideas and analyze information independently. In-Class assessments will promote real-time thinking and confidence in the learners abilities, preparing them for future academic and professional challenges. If you have any questions or concerns about our classes’ AI expectations, please feel free to contact your instructor or book a Student hour meeting to discuss this further and to look for better ways to support you.” 

AI Statement IV: 

“Academic integrity: From Grammarly and ChatGPT, to features that you can’t turn off in other programs, AI is hard (but not impossible) to avoid these days; however, it comes with huge environmental, ethical, and intellectual costs.  It cannot replace your own learning, and research indicates using it literally makes you dumber which seems contrary to why you chose to come to university.  I believe most students are fundamentally honest, care about learning, and want to follow the conventions of academic integrity, such as citing your sources and being clear about where your own words begin and end.  More importantly, I also think each of you has a unique voice and perspective that matters more than a word salad thrown together by an algorithm.  I will therefore treat any use of AI as an academic offense, including an automatic zero on the assignment.  Click here if you want to read the “Student Code of Conduct Policy.” McManus, S. (2025)

AI Statement V:

“Policy on AI use: You are not permitted to use Generative AI tools to support your work UNLESS told in writing that you can do so by the instructor. Online AI- powered tools are publicly available, but they are often not accurate, and contain biases, stereotypes and misleading information that will be detrimental to your learning, critical thinking, and overall success. Within our classroom time we will discuss the use of tools such as ChatGPT and Grammarly to generate text and how they may be used as a learning tool and the effects of it in the business work. Work created by AI tools will not be considered original student work and instead will be considered an academic offence. Assignments may be scrutinized for inclusion of AI written text and content creation. Tools such as Grammarly and Quillbot may be used SOLELY for editing purposes and must be appropriately cited.

Plagiarism & Academic Integrity: Plagiarism is the presentation of someone else's work or idea as our own without the proper acknowledgement or citation of the original piece. Artificial intelligence technologies are considered a source to be cited and cannot be misrepresented as one’s work. Submission of any AI student work without proper citation is considered plagiarism and will be subject to plagiarism policy."

AI Statement VI:

“Academic Dishonesty, Plagiarism and AI Use

Academic dishonesty and plagiarism will not be tolerated and will automatically result in a zero grade for

the submission. The use of AI tools for any of the reasons below for work in this course is a violation of

the University of Lethbridge’s Student Code of Conduct Policy (2025) since the work is not your own. The

use of unauthorized AI tools will result in academic discipline.

The use of generative AI tools is not permitted in this course for the following activities:

• Impersonating you in classroom contexts, such as by using the tool to compose writing prompts assigned to you or content that you submit
• Completing quizzes
• Writing a draft of a writing assignment
• Writing entire sentences, paragraphs or papers to complete class assignments
• Sourcing resources included in your reference page
• Rewriting entire sentences under the guise of editing for grammar and style

Plagiarism Statement:

Misrepresenting the work of others as your own constitutes academic dishonesty and is a punishable

offence at the University of Lethbridge.

1. Don’t take words verbatim (word-for-word) from any written document or website and fail to use quotation marks and a proper reference including a page number.
2. When you paraphrase, you must cite the author(s) from whom you took the ideas/information.
3. Plagiarism intentional or unintentional, has consequences, utilizing Turnitin to check your work prior to submission is recommended.
4. If you have an in-text citation, it must be in the reference list and vice versa.
5. Using artificial intelligence such as ChatGPT, Quillbot or any other AI is prohibited in this class because developing your academic writing skills is a key goal of this course.
   See AI/ChatGPT/Language Learning Models - Use Statement below for more detail.
6. Plagiarism includes using false citations that are generated from programs such as ChatGPT.
7. If you commit plagiarism, you will face serious academic consequences.

Students must be able to submit both electronic and hard copy versions of their work upon request. I highly recommend using google documents for all writing assignments and group work for this reason.

The University of Lethbridge subscribes to Turnitin.com, a plagiarism detection service. Please be advised that student work submitted for credit in this course will be submitted to this system to verify its originality. Turnitin will be integrated with Moodle and your submissions will be screened for similarity to other works. Students will be able to view their similarity rating when they submit their assignments. If you notice that your rating is high, you can delete your submission, fix your citations and similarities, and resubmit your assignment (PRIOR to the deadline). If you do not wish to submit your work through Turnitin, please speak with me about alternate plagiarism-screening options.

AI/ChatGPT/ Language Learning Models - Use Statement:

The use of ChatGPT or any other AI platform/tool to generate ideas, written content, and rewriting entire

sentences under the guise of editing for grammar and style or produce any other material is prohibited in

this course. This is for a number of reasons:

• This class is designed to improve your writing and communication skills. If you are not writing, you are not improving. Writing is something that is a process, and using AI generators shortcuts this process
  without allowing you the ability to build this skill.
• Using AI brings up academic honesty issues because it raises the issue of “is this work your work” and AI/language model tools often take others' work without credit.
• AI and ChatGPT are not always accurate, and will invent sources or display general results to a specific question. This is problematic when you are learning to conduct research and present specific results.

I also value your writing and originality of thought. I became an educator because I am passionate about helping students improve and succeed. I am unable to do this when you submit work that is not your own.

Additionally, I would encourage you to think about the opportunity and privilege that university education presents. Education like the one you are receiving is not available to everyone, and many people do not have the opportunity to spend significant time thinking and learning. Furthermore, someone is paying for you to be here (yourself, your parents/relatives, scholarships/grants, loans, etc). If you choose, to spend this both incredible and expensive opportunity by trying to avoid doing the work of learning through using AI/ChatGPT/Language Model tools – you are ultimately cheating yourself.

Any work submitted that does not fulfill the assignment guidelines regardless of AI/ChatGPT/Language Models usage will be awarded the grade it deserves.”