College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work • Hacker News Board

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#231

Post by TychoCelchuuu » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:16 AM UTC

bartvk wrote: post #221

recursivedoubts wrote: post #2

I used to make my classes 60-80% project work, 40-80% quizzes all online. I now do 50% project work, 50% in person quizzes, pencil on paper on page of notes. I'm increasingly going to paper-driven workflows as well, becoming an expert with the department printer, printing computer science papers for students to read and annotate in class, etc. Ironically, the traditional bureaucratic lag in university might actually…

This. All the drama articles in the media are describing lazy institutions. My tests are almost 100% in person. Project work included, you can hand something in, but I'm going over line by line and ask what you did there. I can do this, because while my school hasn't updated the tests yet, my classes are small and I can do all of them in-person.

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Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#232

Post by sdevonoes » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:26 AM UTC

curun1r wrote: post #229

I'm old enough to remember a similar controversy over whether to allow calculators in math classes. While most schools were banning them to force kids to learn how to do math without them, my school went the other way. They mandated that every student had one and then changed the assignments and tests to account for it. Gone were questions that had whole number answers that could be computed in our heads. Instead, an…

There’s one significant difference between: typewriters and calculators are a one-time-paymeny device. LLMs are subscription based baked by billionaire companies. That alone leaves LLMs in a bad enough place

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#233

Post by oerdier » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:31 AM UTC

curun1r wrote: post #229

I'm old enough to remember a similar controversy over whether to allow calculators in math classes. While most schools were banning them to force kids to learn how to do math without them, my school went the other way. They mandated that every student had one and then changed the assignments and tests to account for it. Gone were questions that had whole number answers that could be computed in our heads. Instead, an…

A critical difference between a calculator and an LLM is that a calculator doesn't make decisions. A calculator performs the operations you type in, nothing more. An LLM does make decisions. The human operator of the LLM needs to be able to evaluate the decisions made by the LLM. That requires education and experience beforehand.

An LLM is a force multiplier only, not a replacement. It's a personal assistant to an expert. To use an LLM in a acceptable way, you still first have to learn how to do what it does yourself. I think your suggestion for people to be taught how to use LLMs is justified, but they should do so only after first being taught a no-LLM curriculum. I think this should be entirely after what the notion of an education was in pre-LLM times. Don't incorporate LLMs into our current education, instead teach use of LLMs after our current education.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#234

Post by muzzleflash » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:33 AM UTC

curun1r wrote: post #229

I'm old enough to remember a similar controversy over whether to allow calculators in math classes. While most schools were banning them to force kids to learn how to do math without them, my school went the other way. They mandated that every student had one and then changed the assignments and tests to account for it. Gone were questions that had whole number answers that could be computed in our heads. Instead, an…

I think the controversial part about AI is far above the "it is a new technology so use it".

When the scientific calculator was invented, people could easily know what went into its production. As in what circuitry appears in them. You knew that if you bought it, it is yours. Want to program it? Grab a book and do this. The whole package would be a fixed price. You are in control. With AI? You are not at all in control. You rely on a big tech giant (or just like 4 useful ones) who is riding what people controversially still call an economic disaster. You are relying on a technology that is designed to very likely bait-and-switch you. As soon as you get too comfortable with AI, the big tech companies can just bump the prices up and you will not be able to say no. You rely on a technology that you do not control.

The comparison of AI to a calculator or any other technological advancement for students is apples and oranges for that reason.

Imagine giving a student a personal AI datacenter to carry with them. This may be more of a fair comparison.

PS Training students on using AI, especially for free, is setting them up for reliance on the big tech companies and the subscription model.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#235

Post by ksenzee » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:34 AM UTC

curun1r wrote: post #229

I'm old enough to remember a similar controversy over whether to allow calculators in math classes. While most schools were banning them to force kids to learn how to do math without them, my school went the other way. They mandated that every student had one and then changed the assignments and tests to account for it. Gone were questions that had whole number answers that could be computed in our heads. Instead, an…

There's a big difference between learning to program a calculator, which is deterministic, and "learning" to prompt an LLM-based AI service that is tuned deliberately to be non-deterministic and that changes every few months. I would prefer my kids learn things like thinking critically and communicating and logic, not spend their time "chatting" with an unpredictable oracle.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#236

Post by tim-projects » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:38 AM UTC

To me this nostalgia is pointless. AI is here and it's good enough only going to get better. The classroom should be about using AI better not ignoring it.

But that would require the teacher to be good at AI too. I think that's the problem here.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#237

Post by shmichael » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:42 AM UTC

curun1r wrote: post #229

I'm old enough to remember a similar controversy over whether to allow calculators in math classes. While most schools were banning them to force kids to learn how to do math without them, my school went the other way. They mandated that every student had one and then changed the assignments and tests to account for it. Gone were questions that had whole number answers that could be computed in our heads. Instead, an…

Imagine military instructors would say that it's important to focus on cavalry and bayonette use just because they can't figure out how to adapt their curriculum to the new reality.

World war I was very much that.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#238

Post by galkk » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:43 AM UTC

curun1r wrote: post #229

I'm old enough to remember a similar controversy over whether to allow calculators in math classes. While most schools were banning them to force kids to learn how to do math without them, my school went the other way. They mandated that every student had one and then changed the assignments and tests to account for it. Gone were questions that had whole number answers that could be computed in our heads. Instead, an…

It was good for you but you don’t address reality of life.

Here’s one possible scenario: After graduation, you (or somebody else) shares the program with friend, with a promise to not to share further. Soon enough, it’s on everybody’s calculator. What did real educational thing for you, is just cheat where one needs to press the right buttons and get the right answer. This completely destroys the educational purpose, but significant amount of people just don’t care and want to get a pass.

Yes, there always is a counter weapon by teachers: for example, to point to random line and ask to explain and whatever, but this is not (always) scalable.

I’ve seen this in reality in college, when there was a cs/database course final project implementation, written in Delphi (very popular at a time in xussr), that was passed from year to year, that the professors and ta were so fed up, that I got almost auto pass because I wrote mine in C++…

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To summarize - the overinreasing amount of pure slop is seen everywhere. Regular multi-thousand line prs where author didn’t even bother to look into code, written by ai. Just prompt -> commit, push, or. Nobody wants to deal with that

Same is happening here - u it’s not to punish people who use tool in proper context, it’s to filter out people who just don’t give a fuck.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#239

Post by tim-projects » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:45 AM UTC

sarchertech wrote: post #95

llbbdd wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Education is a nice side effect sometimes but yeah, I don't know how you could reach any other conclusion. If you're motivated to learn for learning's sake, college is an annoying slog that you know you don't need post-millenium. I literally left college early and started making money instead of spending it, because I got tired of demonstrating to my professors that I already knew everything they were teaching and th…

Or maybe you chose to waste your time because you treated college as a way to get a piece paper instead of as the only time in your life when you are surrounded by experts who will spend an hour a week answering any questions you can think of.

That doesn't work in tech based professions. In college I took music technology. It was 2 years of my own learning and explaining how everything worked to my tutor.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#240

Post by mquander » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 7:48 AM UTC

muzzleflash wrote: post #234

curun1r wrote: post #229

I'm old enough to remember a similar controversy over whether to allow calculators in math classes. While most schools were banning them to force kids to learn how to do math without them, my school went the other way. They mandated that every student had one and then changed the assignments and tests to account for it. Gone were questions that had whole number answers that could be computed in our heads. Instead, an…

I think the controversial part about AI is far above the "it is a new technology so use it". When the scientific calculator was invented, people could easily know what went into its production. As in what circuitry appears in them. You knew that if you bought it, it is yours. Want to program it? Grab a book and do this. The whole package would be a fixed price. You are in control. With AI? You are not at all in contr…

Your comment is framed like "giving a student a personal AI datacenter to carry with them" is unrealistic, but in fact it is easy for anyone with access to $1000-$2000 worth of compute to download and operate exactly that for free, with performance perhaps a year behind the state of the art.