The Kenai Peninsula Borough School District’s Board of Education on Oct. 7 received a presentation on the uses of generative artificial intelligence in schools. Speaker Myron Dueck encouraged the board to explore uses of the technology to create lesson plans and other classroom activities.

In a presentation that stretched over an hour, Dueck described potential uses of generative AI in classrooms by teachers and by students — driven primarily by ChatGPT.

The presentation was invited by KPBSD Superintendent Clayton Holland, who described Dueck as a great presenter and a friend. He said that the district needs to prime staff on AI use, though many are already seeing the technology used by students.

Dueck is a consultant from Canada who gives presentations to schools and educators about generative AI, according to his website. Holland said that Dueck has repeatedly worked with the district in recent years through Project GRAD Kenai Peninsula. Project GRAD is a collaboration between the district, Kenai Peninsula College, “fellow nonprofits” and tribal organizations that works to improve educational outcomes for the district’s “most rural and isolated communities,” per the organization’s website.

Holland on Monday, Oct. 14, said that the presentation was intended to “bring the board and the community along” as the district grapples with the emerging technology. After presenting to the board early last week, Dueck also presented to district instructors on Friday.

Some teachers have experimented with AI, especially language arts teachers who encountered the technology early, Holland said. Others may only have begun to consider uses of AI after seeing Dueck’s presentation.

Teachers, Dueck said during his presentation to the board, can ask ChatGPT to help design lesson plans — like creating a lesson to respond to relevant incidents of bullying or racism; a lesson inspired by rocks found on the beach; or an experiment showcasing the varied conductivity of two metals. He suggested using ChatGPT to create dozens of questions on a single topic that could then be assigned individually to each student.

AI, Dueck said, “continues to brainstorm what the teacher could do.”

The value of teachers as a participant in that process, he said, can’t be discounted. His example about metal conductivity showcases the failings of the technology. In screenshots from his own use of ChatGPT shared during the presentation, the platform suggested a “conduction race” of copper versus aluminum wire. Each metal would be connected to a battery, to see which can conduct the electricity fastest to light up a small bulb.

Such an experiment, the platform says, is “visually appealing” — and ChatGPT lays out the whole procedure.

But, a physics teacher of 25 years took one look at that result and saw that the proposed experiment wouldn’t accurately highlight the differences in conductivity because both metals conduct electricity too quickly for students to see a difference.

“My friend said ‘you’re going to look like an idiot,’” Dueck said. “These systems, they’re not perfect. You cannot overly rely on them.”

Dueck said the knowledge and experiences of teachers can’t be replaced, but he encourages the use of ChatGPT as a timesaver and tool for bouncing ideas off.

“Generative AI can make education better, not worse,” Dueck said. “I hope you realize that what I’m arguing today is the genie is out of the bottle. It’s not going back in.”

Technology demands an evolution in education, he said, informed by an understanding of what AI is and isn’t capable of. He said ChatGPT is good at answering right or wrong questions, creating simple poetry or stories — less capable at sharing personal experiences, explaining its process, or reflecting on classroom activity.

Teachers should have open dialogue with students about AI, Dueck said. They should recognize which assignments might have a place for AI as a tool and which AI shouldn’t be permitted for.

That sentiment appealed to board member Jason Tauriainen, who said that the district needs to understand AI as “powerful tools” while remaining “relevant in the classroom.”

Holland said Monday that district leadership and staff need to reckon with the ways AI is “changing the face of education” and craft a response. There needs to be, he said, a collective understanding so AI isn’t being approached differently in all 42 KPBSD schools.

For Holland, that means developing guidelines for use in the classroom and also using the technology to create efficiencies internally. AI is a tool, and Holland suggested its use for data analysis, to create draft schedules or more quickly reference district policy.

In an “ironic” twist, Holland said the evolution of AI has led instructors to more project-based learning, “things you can’t use AI for, things that you present in class, things that you have to demonstrate in real life.”

In the long term, Holland said a working group will help craft a districtwide belief statement and philosophy for AI ethics. Holland said he’s interested in seeing AI used as a tool, but that it can’t replace the important human element of instruction.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Holland said, a diminishing of the human element of instruction is what “harmed education.” That wasn’t good for kids.

“That was my takeaway,” Holland said. “The need to have human contact, the need to be human and have that interaction. As we move forward with AI, we are aware of that.”

An element of the AI conversation not covered by Dueck during his presentation is concerns about where generative AI platforms source their information.

“Generative AI makes the response up the moment you ask it to,” he said. “It doesn’t exist anywhere else on the internet; it’s generating it in the moment.”

But when Dueck asks ChatGPT to create an itinerary for a family outing to Girdwood, that information comes from data sourced by ChatGPT and included in its large language model. In the examples Dueck shared to the board, the platform said its dataset only includes information as of September 2021, and that some of its recommendations may no longer be accurate.

Any classroom project or lesson created by the technology comes from somewhere, and ChatGPT doesn’t disclose from where it’s pulling the information it serves up.

The owners of ChatGPT, which was the basis of Dueck’s presentation, were sued by newspapers, authors, actors and others this year and last year for copying their content and feeding it into the large language models that drive the technology in alleged violation of U.S. copyright laws. None of those cases have yet been resolved.

A Pew Research Center survey in March said 54% of respondents thought generative AI programs should credit source material they review in responses created from large language models.

A full recording of Dueck’s presentation to the school board can be found on the KPBSD Board Docs site, in the agenda for the Oct. 7 “Board of Education Work Sessions.”

Reach reporter Jake Dye at jacob.dye@peninsulaclarion.com.