Generative AI and Copilot: General Principles of GenAI

Generative AI can be very powerful tools to help you study and aid your study process, however, it is critical that you use it in an ethical and responsible way.

As a Student you are responsible for ensuring that all your submitted work reflects your own understanding of the topic, and that the material is a product of your own effort.

This means that you cannot use AI to generate responses to your class work (whether informal or format assessment submissions) as this would be a breech of Academic Integrity.

1. All use of AI must be consistent with the five Ethical Principles contained in ECU's Framework for the Productive and Ethical Use of Artificial Intelligence. 

2. Ensure your use of AI follows the guidelines given for the particular course, unit, and assessment

• Follow your instructor’s guidance on exactly what and how generative AI tools can be used during assessments for your unit

• Ensure that any use of generative AI has been cited and acknowledged according to the unit (and ECU) policies and guidelines (when submitting via Canvas there will be an acknowledgement check box)

• Use of AI in a way that is not consistent with policies and guidelines can result in a finding of academic misconduct.

3. Keep track throughout your assignment process of the ways you have used generative AI

• Save copies of each step to create a record that can be shared with instructors to facilitate respectful conversations about your work. For example, keep copies of your previous drafts before and after interacting with generative AI.

4. Ensure that your final work is your own and is not copy and pasted from a generative AI tool

• Your own style and voice should be evident

• Simply rephrasing AI-generated content is not enough for it to be considered your own work! You must still apply your own critical thinking and logical reasoning to write assignments and, most importantly, ensure learning

• If you directly quote Gen AI follow the guidelines at: Software/apps, code, datasets, and AI tools

5. Exercise critical thinking and disciplinary expertise when considering AI-generated information 

• It is important to fact-check the information you receive. Note the limitations of generative AI, including that content generated by AI may not be up to date, content generated by AI may not be accurate, and its limited ability to provide a reliable source for the information it outputs.

6. Be wary of biases in the generative AI you are using

1. Use it to understand your topic

• Ask it to explain difficult concepts in varied ways
• Use it to brainstorm topics (it can help you to step outside yourself and your own biases)
• Get it to quiz you on lecture notes and create practice questions for you to try

2. Plan and structure your response

• ​​​​​​​Ask it to break your assessment question down into tasks and a study schedule
• Get it to create draft essay structures (suggesting paragraph structures for you)

3. Research strategies

• ​​​​​​​Use it to generate search keywords and synonyms
• Ask it to construct search strings (with full Boolean syntax)
• MAKE SURE TO USE THE LIBRARY SEARCH OR DATABASES FOR THE ACTUAL SEARCH
• Help summarise articles before fully reading them

4. Write your own work!

5. Edit and proofread

6. Understanding your feedback

These pages focus on Understanding your assignment topic, Planning your work, and Research strategies. Check out the Academic Skills @ ECU page on Using Generative AI for Assignments for other tips.

This guide also guides you on acknowledging and referencing your use of GenAI (see the Referencing guide at Software/apps, code, datasets, and AI tools.)