Not a day goes by without a startling new development in the rapid impact of AI on the way that we live, learn and understand our world.

In recent weeks, the latest iteration of Anthropic’s Claude models has been launched, but these have been restricted from international use due to US government export legislation.

In Melbourne there was reporting on a widespread VCE cheating scandal at an independent school, where 35 students were alleged to have breached VCE guidelines in their use of AI to compose their scripts for oral presentations. Both of these episodes are indicative of the huge challenge faced by administrators, legislators and educators to keep up with a rapidly changing landscape.

An internationally contested AI “arms race” that creates access inequality threatens to have an outsized impact, as the emerging power of cutting edge AI could create enormous advantages to the haves over the have-nots.

Educators face a substantial challenge in guiding their students through this new world when they are grappling to understand the implications of the technology themselves.

At King David, we have collaboratively developed AI guidelines to support our educators in their decision making about use of the technology, how to protect data and maintain privacy, and how and when to authorise their students to make use of AI models to support their learning.

Furthermore, we devoted our most recent Professional Development day to helping staff enhance their understanding of what AI is and is not. We were privileged to work with a leading consultant in the educational use of AI, Dr. Leon Furze.

Dr. Furze provided a broad and engaging explanation of the emergence of recently proliferated AI models and unpacked how they operate, source data, and respond to prompts. This was a valuable opportunity for our staff to appreciate that utilising AI tools is very different from using a search engine, and that successful use is underpinned by developing a sophisticated understanding of what the AI is trained to do.

Dr Furze led our teachers in a deep dive into what meaningful assessment looks like in the face of widely available generative AI models. Of interest was that Dr Furze’s starting point was not how to avoid cheating, but rather, how to effectively utilise our assessment structures to gain an authentic evaluation of how our students are faring in their acquisition of key knowledge and skills. This necessitates teachers designing assessment tasks that are not subject to manipulation in ways that mask a student’s actual capabilities.

Finally, Dr Furze worked with our administration and business team on ways that we can  improve our functionality and efficiency utilising the embedded AI tools that are currently available.

AI represents a revolutionary change to many aspects of our lives and while the landscape is changing at a rapid rate, we are determined to engage our educators in vital discussions about ethical, responsible and effective use. This enables our teachers to support our students by gifting them with the skills and values that will help them accommodate this technology to support their educational journeys.