Students taking the International Baccalaureate will be allowed to quote from work generated by ChatGPT in their essays, The Times reports.
The IB has said it will not ban the AI chatbot, and that dealing with its pitfalls will be similar to previous plagiarism challenges.
Matt Glanville, head of assessment principles and practice at the IB, said those working in schools or assessment should be excited rather than terrified by ChatGPT and “embrace it as an extraordinary opportunity”. He likened it to spellchecking software and translation apps.
He said that children taking the IB would be able to use work generated by ChatGPT as long as they attribute it correctly and do not pretend it is their own work.
Mr Glanville told The Times: “The clear line between using ChatGPT and providing original work is exactly the same as using ideas taken from other people or the internet. As with any quote or material adapted from another source, it must be credited in the body of the text and appropriately referenced in the bibliography.
“Essay-writing is, however, being profoundly challenged by the rise of new technology and there’s no doubt that it will have much less prominence in the future.
“When AI can essentially write an essay at the touch of a button, we need our pupils to master different skills, such as understanding if the essay is any good or if it has missed context, has used biased data or if it is lacking in creativity. These will be far more important skills than writing an essay, so the assessment tasks we set will need to reflect this.”
Rather than an outright ban, as has been enforced at school districts in the US, India and China, the IB said it would work with schools so they can help pupils use AI ethically as an educational tool.