Entering the 2025-2026 school year, Troy High School continues to enforce its plagiarism policy, which states that any student that turns in work that is not their own will receive disciplinary action. As the orientation packets passed out to the student body earlier this year state, artificial intelligence (AI) is considered a form of plagiarism.
AI use in classrooms has been an ongoing occurrence, affecting the learning experience from multiple perspectives. Lisa Knudson, English teacher at Troy High School, claims that AI “hits the English department pretty hard.”
Multiple English teachers have been receiving AI-generated work from their students.
“When it comes to essays, I feel like I can’t trust anybody anymore,” says Knudson. “It’s created double, if not triple, the grading time, because I have to go through each individual paper and run it through different [AI] checkers.”
As AI chat bots like ChatGPT and Gemini Google rapidly evolve, multiple students are seemingly growing dependent on them.
Andre Collaku, English teacher at Troy High School, believes that “AI hurts way more than it helps the student.” He says, “Every time I go into my class, there’s one student trying to AI something or another.”
Similar to Knudson, Collaku has dealt with the drawbacks of English students submitting AI-generated essays. Collaku says that some students who “write something really good” often lie about using AI when asked. He claims that he gives AI-generated work a zero and warns his students ahead of time.
“I would rather have you come clean and tell me you need help and I’ll help you,” Collaku expresses.
In terms of the effects of AI on students, many of the teachers respond with concern. “It doesn’t teach them anything,” says Knudson. “I teach seniors, and you guys are going to college next year, and I don’t want you relying on AI and turning in work that you didn’t do.”
Collaku emphasizes the idea of students missing out on the process of deep thinking. “School and education, and especially English class, is not about whether you have the right answer or not,” he claims, “When you read a text and you analyze a text, you’re working out a specific part of your mind that is used for critical thinking,” he also adds that, “It’s kind of like a stone sharpening steel.”
While AI use in the classroom may be deemed negative in certain scenarios, AI has been used in the classroom to aid ELD, English Language Development, students with their learning process. Christina Rick, an ELD and English teacher at Troy High School, elaborates on the many ways that ELD students benefit from AI. “It takes a lot of pressure off of [ELD] students. They can do their homework more efficiently and spend less time word-to-word translating,” says Rick. However, Rick goes over the plagiarism policy with her students to help them understand the differences between using AI as a tool and claiming its work as their own.
While multiple teachers have concerns about AI within the classroom, a couple of students explain how they use AI to improve their learning experience. Senior Sanjana Prabhu says she uses AI to help her, “dumb down certain topics that [she] might be struggling with.”
Prabhu expresses that AI offers “that quick, convenient, almost like teacher and mentor role,” for when she doesn’t have direct help from her teacher or classmates.
Varsha Rajesh, senior, explains how she feeds AI her notes or a specific reading and has it “give [her] practice questions to use to kind of study.”
Overall, Rajesh expresses that she thinks “AI is going to be beneficial if we learn to use it in the right way.”
While AI softwares are continuing to advance, their role in the classroom raises many questions and concerns.
