by Chris McGregor,
GHS/GMS Principal
Happy November! I don’t know how many people actually read my September newsletter but for those of you that did, would it surprise you to know that 70% of it was written by Artificial Intelligence?
While I think of myself as a pretty decent writer, there were some phrases in that newsletter that might have given it away that I didn’t write all of it. “As we usher in the crisp, autumnal days of September” was the first one. The word “autumnal” is not one that I use very often in my day-to-day speech or writing.
With all the buzz these days about A.I. and the national attention it is getting, I thought it would be fun to see what kind of a newsletter article it could make for me. The online A.I. tool I used to write it was called ChatGPT.
Four MS/HS teachers and I recently went to a workshop and spent a lot of time exploring the world of A.I. and ChatGPT specifically. It was very informative and somewhat mind blowing. There really are so many possibilities for the use of A.I. both in school and in the world as a whole. The big question for schools is, how do we want staff and students to use it and what do we consider to be ethical ways in which to use it?
The two major takeaways from the A.I. workshop were 1) we are just at the tip of the iceberg with A.I. so hold on for a wild ride, and 2) in any use of A.I. there should be a human element at both the beginning and end of it.
I think it can be a powerful and useful tool for use in the school, but we will definitely need to do things like verifying the information that is generated, properly cite the source, and take care in editing the information to our needs.
We certainly live in an exciting time of innovation and discovery. I just hope we can learn to use A.I. in positive and helpful ways to enhance the education of our students. So, for now that’s all I have to say about A.I. and I can assure you that I wrote every word of the article this time. Or did I?
Past and future newsletters from the Garretson School District can always be found at https://www.garretson.k12.sd.us/documents/district-newsletters/12498.
