"Burying your head in the sand is not realistic," says Geertje. "Generative AI is here to stay, which is why we, as a university, need to think about how to deal with it. In January 2024, we submitted a memorandum on GenAI in education to the Executive Board. As a result, the Information & Library Services (ILS) and Academic Affairs (AA) divisions were commissioned to investigate whether it is possible to make a generative AI tool available campus-wide and whether we can draw up guidelines and rules for its use."
Generative AI Tool Working Group
That AI tool will become available. As soon as more is known about this, it will be communicated. "People have been using the free versions of various generative AI models for a long time, and they are only free because you give away your data. That is precisely why it is important as a university to offer an alternative to this," Mathilde emphasizes. A working group was formed within ILS to work on the assignment of the Executive Board.
"It's a bit of a chicken-and-egg story," Mathilde explains, "because we don't know specifically what people would want to use the tool for." "That's why we want people to experiment in a safe environment so that we can get a better picture of the needs." In addition, the working group looks at responsible use of the tool: What guidelines, with regards to security, privacy, copyright, ethics and sustainability, do we provide and where can people go with questions?
GenAI on the agenda of the education strategy
The rise of generative AI also poses challenges for the design of education. What do we want students to learn? How do we learn them to learn? What if they could outsource everything to AI? How do we set up assessment and what do we consider fraud? But at the same time, GenAI offers many opportunities to personalize education and reduce the workload for lecturers. This is being considered in various places at the university, such as within the examination boards and faculties. Some individual lecturers or study programmes have already made a lot of progress and do very interesting experiments. For example, the medical faculty has recently drawn up concrete guidelines for the use of GenAI in their education, which could possibly also be applied more widely.
Geertje and Mathilde expect that in a few months, we will have more clarity about the place of GenAI on the university's strategic education agenda, which is currently being further refined and elaborated based on the new educational vision. Geertje: "We know that steps are going to be taken, but we don't yet know what this will exactly look like. Once the key strategic areas for educational innovation are clear, we will also know whether, for example, there will be an assignment to make institution-wide policy on AI and education. In any case, the starting point now is to let study programmes take control of this so that there is room for customization that is in line with their educational practice. At Education Support, we do intend to develop training courses to increase the awareness and knowledge of lecturers in the field of GenAI."
Participation in national networks
"Nationally, we see that educational institutions are really busy with this theme." Geertje: "On behalf of Radboud University, Academic Affairs recently joined a national network on education policy in relation to GenAI. We are also taking part in SURF's AI policy for education learning pathway." Within these networks, education policy is considered that takes into account the opportunities offered by GenAI, but also whether and how it can be used responsibly. "This is a good way for us to keep up to date with what is going on nationally and to see how other universities are dealing with this interesting challenge," says Geertje. "In addition, we have to seriously ask ourselves what risks we run if we don't develop a generic policy for this."
AIdeas for Learning and SIG AI and Education merged
Many people are actively working on the theme of GenAI in education within the university. From September, the AIdeas for Learning project from the Radboudumc and the Special Interest Group 'AI and Education' from Radboud University will be merged. Here, knowledge is shared about the latest developments in AI and the consequences for education are examined.
You can join and stay informed! Read more about this SIG or take a look in the Teams channel (you can request access).
