In the face of new discoveries, we need to adapt and redefine ourselves. With AI, rather than focusing on evaluating answers, it is necessary to develop the critical ability to ask questions.

ChatGPT, which has already reached its upgraded version GPT-4, now has several “siblings” and is even already integrated into other programs, apps, and operating systems. Among many voices, the education sector has widely discussed the new chatbot based on artificial intelligence (AI) that can produce texts and interact with people. Once again posing the eternal dilemma: should academia adapt or resist change? As analysed in an article published by Harvard Business Publishing, every time a new technology emerges in our lives, polarisation occurs. On the one hand, there are those who loudly denounce its dangers, asserting the need to contain them, and warn against the harmful advance of certain trends, perceived as an undesirable drift and lack of humanity. On the other hand, those who emphasise the positive nature of progress and, while not hiding its risks, look at the importance of accompanying and guiding new generations to responsible and conscious uses. It is widely accepted that many discoveries and technologies are not inherently good or bad in themselves, but rather it is their application that could be.

Adapting and redesigning

History has taught us that resisting progress and evolution is almost always futile and perhaps even harmful. Therefore, it seems more appropriate to try to teach our younger generations how to make the best of new tools, for positive uses and the common good. There is no doubt that these innovations are here to stay. Educational institutions – universities and schools in general – must therefore ask themselves two related questions: how to adapt and how to redesign themselves. Firstly, by deciding how to incorporate these new technologies that require constant updating into their curricula. Secondly, by modifying historically established actions and the processes on which these innovations have an impact, for example (among many others) the process and nature of assessing our students’ performances.

Critical skills

As teachers, we have a great responsibility in educating young talents who will contribute to developing a society that – we hope – is increasingly sustainable. For this reason, we should teach them how AI can be helpful in doing better what is inherent to and distinguishes human nature, namely creativity, originality, innovativeness, and artistic, cultural, and scientific expressiveness. Even though ChatGPT seems to surprise us with its intelligence, even its most updated version is actually simply providing us with answers based on statistics, large amounts of data, and recurrences, replicating and then memorising similar situations, questions, and answers already encountered previously. Our task is, therefore, to train our students to use all this, to develop and communicate new ideas to implement and make them successful. We must convince the younger generations that they should not fear being replaced by machines, but rather by other human beings who are able to use these innovations better, and perhaps for no good purpose. The challenge, therefore, lies in developing critical skills in our students, especially competences, which we have been talking about for years but which, in practice, we struggle greatly to promote.

Asking the right questions

This brings us to the second aspect: until now, evaluation has always been focused mainly on output. We ask students to perform a task and then evaluate that performance in terms of results/output (it could be an essay, a presentation, a test…). The time has come to shift the focus – with courage and not without difficulty – to the learning process and the inputs. At ESCP Business School, as in many other universities, a significant component of assessment is always given to class participation and to students’ contributions during courses and lectures. Another example is the use of old techniques such as “debates”, where students have to play roles and “defend” ideas, providing arguments and evidence supporting one thesis or another. In ESCP’s Executive MBA, we offer an “Art Thinking” seminar that allows students, through the creation of a piece of art, to study the creative process of artists and apply it in the business world to better tackle unexpected, unpredictable and unlikely situations. These are highly experiential paths that no AI can ever replicate. Assuming that ChatGPT can write and give us perfect answers to any question (and now even provide images or entire lines of programming codes), we must therefore change the focus and begin to evaluate students’ ability to ask the right questions, rather than provide answers. There is nothing new in this, actually, as anyone who has studied a bit of the history of philosophy, progress, and science since Socrates knows. An artist, an entrepreneur, a scientist, a lawyer, a police officer or a politician needs to develop a brilliant intellectual curiosity that stimulates them to question themselves continually. Rather than providing pre-established answers to our students, we have to teach them the art of asking the right questions and, additionally, the ability to evaluate the quality and correctness of the answers provided by others. Because the ability to recognise a right answer from a wrong one is never easy or should never be taken for granted. This – at least for now – has not yet been replaced by any machine and perhaps never will be. It is with this consideration that we should urgently change the focus of our attention and the assessments of educators and teachers.

AUTHOR

Associate Professor of Accounting at ESCP Business School, Francesco Venuti is the Dean of the world-leading Executive MBA and the General Management Programme (GMP). He is also the Academic Director of the Specialized Master in International Food & Beverage Management (IFBM – DEAMIE) and of the Specialization in Food&Beverage for the Master in Management (MIM) in Turin. In parallel to his specific field of research, he has always cultivated a specific attention to pedagogy and teaching innovations.

This article was originally published in Italian by the “Corriere Della Sera” (with some adaptations).