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

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

#261

Post by maplethorpe » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:26 AM UTC

Levitz wrote: post #121

maplethorpe wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't the selling point of AI that it does it for you? What's to learn?

"It does X for you" is the point of many technologies. You still require knowledge to work around it. Context helps immensely, for example. Think of what you can do that someone outside tech can't.

> "It does X for you" is the point of many technologies. You still require knowledge to work around it.

When running water replaced the need to pump water out of the ground yourself, were people urged to "learn faucets"? You kind of just need to twist a knob and water comes out, right?

Maybe there was an intermediary stage where running water was slightly more complicated and there were more steps to learn, but devoting time to learning those steps would have been a waste of time, since the end goal of the system was for it to function without much input.

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

#262

Post by encrux » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:26 AM UTC

madrox wrote: post #244

amtamt wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Rather than banning the use of AI and trying to catch students who are cheating, why aren't they creating schoolwork that requires AI? That is way to high recurring cost that many won't be able to afford. One could get a second hand calculator or even computer, and then additional resources needed was one's willingness. With mandating AI usage, we'd only increase the gap of haves and have-nots. I personally do not…

This is probably the fairest counter argument I’ve heard. One can hope that today’s AI will eventually be as cheap as a calculator, though.

AI in it‘s current phase, definitely. However, we‘ve been seeing the transformer architecture plateauing in the last couple of years. There are still improvements, but open source models are catching up.

I feel like at this point it’s an inevitability that given enough time, capable models will be cheap enough for everyone.

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

#263

Post by vincnetas » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:29 AM UTC

oerdier wrote: post #233

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 ex…

continuing on personal asistant analogy, i bet even now we have ultra rich people who are not smart enough to do things themselves but are smart enough to buy (hire) smart people to work for them. And even allow them to make decisions without understanding them. But with only a guard rails : does this produce wealth for me. If yes, do what you need, i don't care :)

So this i think is applicable to AI also, pay for smarter than you AI's pit them against each other, let them supervise each other and measure the outcomes you need. Who cares how they achieve that (sound clinical and scary)

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

#264

Post by LtWorf » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:29 AM UTC

nradov wrote: post #207

jimbokun wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if the companies hiring students from those universities have come to understand there’s no guarantee they learned any of the material.

The dirty secret in HR is that performance in most regular jobs doesn't really depend on having learned anything in college. Companies only require a college degree to filter the candidate pool down to a manageable level. Line managers know they'll have to train entry level hires on almost everything. IBM used to hire software developers based on aptitude test scores regardless of formal education, then put them thro…

Most companies expect people to be productive sooner rather than later, and not every job is completely trivial.

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

#265

Post by PunchyHamster » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:30 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…

> So I can't help but wonder whether schools are going about this all wrong. Rather than banning the use of AI and trying to catch students who are cheating, why aren't they creating schoolwork that requires AI?

Because using AI is the complete opposite of "I learned programming just to make tests easier".

By learning how to program solver, you not only learned how to program but also learned the method well enough to write it.

By pawning it off to AI to solve, you have learned nothing, not even how to prompt correctly as test questions are usually formulated well enough that AI doesn't need prompt massaging to get it.

You can use AI to get some knowledge about the problem (assuming you won't hit hallucination) but that's not what will happen when you use it for test.

And if you DO want to teach students how to use AI effectively, you can just have an AI class...

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

#266

Post by PunchyHamster » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:30 AM UTC

yorwba wrote: post #260

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…

So, scientific calculators - made tasks easy that were a necessary prerequisite for advanced math (basic arithmetic), but not what the lesson was supposed to be about - could in theory also let students skip over what they were supposed to be learning (applying the correct operations in the correct order to solve a problem) but doing so would require programming or getting a program from someone else, which the teach…

Homework is waste of time for everyone involved tho

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

#267

Post by rwmj » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:31 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…

We weren't allowed to use calculators until aged 16 and I'm glad because I learned to do mental arithmetic. Many people I know, even in STEM, aren't able to do that, or lack a feel for numbers.

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

#268

Post by qwedaH » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:31 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…

Because AI is different from calculators. People stop thinking and just excel at verbose and incomplete rationalizations of every evil, just like you do in your reply.

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

#269

Post by mschuster91 » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:31 AM UTC

mquander wrote: post #252

latexr wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but in fact it is easy for anyone with access to $1000-$2000 worth of compute Even if we assume that to be true, you severely underestimate how many people that condition excludes.

It doesn't exclude people who attend high schools and colleges that have a computer lab.

That however requires significant investments - either each computer gets a powerful GPU for local inference (which cost a fortune) or the school gets a rack worth of compute. Most schools however even struggle to get their children fed.

Another issue is that it forces kids to stay in school for longer to do their homework, which can be a serious problem in rural areas where public transport is limited, so parents are forced to fetch their kids from school which may not be compatible with working hours.

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

#270

Post by zozbot234 » Sun, Apr 19, 2026, 8:31 AM UTC

yorwba wrote: post #260

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…

So, scientific calculators - made tasks easy that were a necessary prerequisite for advanced math (basic arithmetic), but not what the lesson was supposed to be about - could in theory also let students skip over what they were supposed to be learning (applying the correct operations in the correct order to solve a problem) but doing so would require programming or getting a program from someone else, which the teach…

> - cannot reliably be restricted in functionality to leave the part the students are supposed to do themselves to the student

Small local LLMs are essentially that. If an LLM can tell you to eat rocks as a tasty snack or use glue to make the cheese stick to your pizza, imagine what it says when you ask it to analyze/explain complex academic subjects, or solve fiddly problems. But it will still reliably help you polish your language, like a subject-specific dictionary/thesaurus.