Latvian Radio higlights RSU's approach to the use of AI in education

The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into academia is reshaping the landscape of higher education, with Rīga Stradiņš University (RSU) at the forefront of this evolution. As universities worldwide grapple with the ethical and pedagogical implications of adopting AI, RSU, alongside the University of Latvia, has developed comprehensive guidelines to navigate its use in teaching.

Latvian Radio spoke with students and academic staff at the University, publishing a story on 16 April. The article was republished on the news portal eng.lsm.lv in English.

[...] At [Rīga] Stradiņš University, the guidelines are aimed at lecturers [as well as students], encouraging them to integrate AI more into their teaching, said Nora Jansone-Ratinīka, Associate Professor and Director of the Centre for Pedagogical Development.

"One of the tasks and responsibilities of the lecturer is to define in the courses of study, depending on the field and the specifics of the course of study, how students can use AI and how lecturers themselves encourage students to use these tools in assignments and assessments,"

explained the RSU representative.

Asked if there are any areas where AI tools are discouraged, Jansone-Ratinika said, "I think it is one of the educational technologies that has very much taken over the educational space, but none of the AI tools are an end in themselves. If we see that it works effectively and that we can really learn better, more usefully and faster this way, then we do it. But to prioritize areas or again to exclude other content areas where the use of AI would definitely not be allowed, I think not."

The students Latvian Radio met in the corridors of the university, especially in the medical field, mostly said they did not trust AI and did not think it was helpful so far in a field where most of the knowledge had to be proven in practice.

"I think AI is too stupid to be used in studies. I study medicine and I do not trust artificial intelligence.

You should read papers written by scientists, not by a computer, because it is you who should know, not a robot. The answers he gives me are usually very inadequate, I have used ChatGPT. It may be that the free one is worse than the paid version."

"I have had to use it and it may help answer some questions. But sometimes wrongly, and this cannot be accepted immediately as 100% fact, but needs to be checked further."

[...]

Līga Ozoliņa, a lecturer at the Faculty of Social Sciences at RSU, confirmed that students, as well as the lecturers themselves, are experimenting with artificial intelligence tools. However, at the moment, for example, the texts it generates are easily recognisable to the lecturer.

"Lecturers have a trained eye, we know what we are looking for. We look for current literature, references, and how the idea is structured, and if you read the text carefully, you can immediately see some AI tendencies - politically correct text, polished, well, like beads strung together, but knowing our students and their writing style, we can immediately recognize if it is the student's level, how the language is used.

"It's on the level of feeling, of course, and nothing is 100%, [..], but it's an indication that there's something wrong with the text. So that level of prior knowledge is still important and we cannot now say that we are going to do everything by artificial intelligence and finish university with a distinction diploma. I do not think that is possible at the moment. If maybe one lecturer misses it, then there will be a course where it won't work and they will be caught," said Ozoliņa.

Read full article on ENG.LSM.LV