Don't give a healthy walker crutches: some reflections on the use of AI in Higher Education

A lot has been written and is flooding LinkedIn and other social media spaces regarding the use of AI in the higher education classroom. In this piece I will address some points including the harms it will inflict as well as point at some ways in which it has been pushed and accepted by those involved in HE teaching. In no way does this blog purport to be exhaustive on the topic. It is a result of my observations, reading and reflections on the issues discussed below.

One reason (turned mantra if you ask me) frequently pointed out in favour of implementing AI in the curriculum is that "AI is the new normal" in the workplace. OK, but I am not preparing students for the workplace; I am preparing them for academic study requiring critical thinking, working with sources, building an informed argument when researching a topic and presenting their conclusions in a coherent way using appropriate language and style. If they can rely for all of that on AI, then AI will be doing it in their workplace, so they would not even have to look for a job because AI will already have taken it. Besides, how can an academic writing tutor know what for and how will AI be used in an engineering context or in an accounting company? This is the case for my context as I am mainly invovled in academic writing, research and study skills area.

I cannot help but notice the change in language in the persuasive pitches on AI, which is a direct way of pushing these tools in education. First, it was the calculator metaphor. AI was compared to a tool. It is not. A calculator will not learn on the basis of input. It just performs basic tasks. Later, I was seeing a lot of "AI as a thinking partner", assuming an equal standing to the human. But why? Is the human not capable enough of reasoning for themselves? And why choose a non-human entity as a thinking partner rather than another human? The latest and by far the most mocking I have seen is "keep the human in the loop" suggesting the human will be pushed almost out of the picture and serve as AI's tool, completely reversing the initially intended roles. Another interesting word I noted in some publications promoting the use of AI for research and writing is "revolutionizing". This is pure mockery as there is nothing revolutionary in ceding all the hard and essential work to a machine and presenting the final product as your own. This is promoting dishonesty and sloth.

Here is a snippet from a book promoting the use of AI in education I saw on LinkedIn where in the chapter on designing assessments (in this instance a written one on a literature course) the authors suggest AI is taken for granted and it is the default position, therefore teachers should shift their expectations and the goalposts to match assessment validity to outcomes. This is a very dangerous path to tread on and can have huge implications regarding the way learners engage with texts and ideas. 

The exerpt mentions students struggling to engage with the original text. I have seen arguments to the effect that AI tools will help level the field for L2 users. This is a gatekeeping issue - if that is the case, then universities should drop their language entry requirements altogether, which will have implications for the whole exam and L2 language teaching industries. I am struck by how carelessly this has been shoved under the carpet and educators are actually trying to justify and welcome these tools in their practice thinking this will save their job and make them more advanced, modern and adaptible professionals. If a student finds a tool more useful than you are, that's it. They will not give a penny for your thoughts when they can get a competitive advantage for free. The same holds true for using AI for academic purposes. Accepting and teaching the use of genAI to search, summarise, synthesise sources is the last stronghold. Ceding crucial human cognition to the machine is subverting the natural order and will not come without consequences.

There is no conclusive and persuasive evidence of AI boosting students' achievement in academic writing. This is among the highlights of a systematic review on the matter published by Elsevier and available through Science direct:

"AI enhances academic writing in six areas: idea generation, content structuring, literature synthesis, data management, editing, and ethical compliance" (Khalifa and Albadwy, 2024).

This points to AI boosting the final product but in no way does it show how it helped students improve their skills in producing this outcome. Using AI for brainstoring and structuring content is actually doing the opposite - depriving students of the opportunity to learn doing it themselves. While AI can improve the writing product, it disadvantages the writer. The structure and outline of writing is closely interwoven with reading and reposonding to the ideas of others, building your own argument. AI cannot (and should not) do that for you!

Another problem I see here is that of fairness and ethics. If one writer does the research and writing all by themselves and another heavily uses AI and gets a better final product, who is to gain more credit? I thought we are all for the process and not the final product, right? And if journals would accept the latter, why do writing tutors frown at students doing the same? Have we come to the point where academic research and writing is a performative task with no real substance?

But to go back to the perspective of the writing instructor: if we usually implement research-informed practices in education, why are we being urged to implement AI in this case? If we can do our job well and show good results, why should we enhance it or get empowered? Changing one's work practices will be uncomfortable and unnatural and that is the opposite of empowering. These tools were not created with educators and students in mind but educators are made to think of ways to incorporate them into teaching and learning under institutional pressure and fear of falling behind and, consequently, to the benefit of big tech business interests. 

My message to educators is simple - don't teach students how to use AI for writing, show them how to write without it - by example, demos in class, scaffolding into the synthesis of ideas stage. Rationalise and explain the benefits of not using AI, show them the beauty of research and build confidence so they can find their own voices!

Don't give crutches to a healthy walker! They will eventually start limping.

Mirena Nalbantova

01/09/2026

Reference:

Khalifa, M., & Albadawy, M. (2024). Using artificial intelligence in academic writing and research: an essential productivity tool. Computer Methods and Programs in Biomedicine Update, 5, 1-11. Article 100145. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmpbup.2024.100145