In October of 2024, Marc Watkins opened a thoughtful discussion on open disclosure of AI tools; after considering his comments and my response to them, I created an AI disclosure guide for my spring 2025 courses. Early in this term, I explained to my students my concerns about generative AI and the rationale for using a disclosure statement for AI tools. I think I foolishly hoped that having a disclosure policy would mean that I wouldn’t have to deal with potential AI-based plagiarism in my courses.
A week ago, I noticed a suspicious paragraph in theearly draft of an essay from a multilingual student in my FYC course. This student had spoken to me early on about wanting to make sure she learned English “the right way,” without recourse to AI tools that would get her in trouble. Given the overall voice and development in the essay, the presence of this one paragraph seemed surprising—and to my frustration, the student had not included an AI disclosure.
In a quiet moment before the next class, I asked her about tools she was using in her revision process, and she explained that she was avoiding AI—she was using “only the Microsoft rewrite tool” embedded in the latest version of MS-Word as a help on vocabulary in a paragraph that was giving her trouble. I had not heard of the rewrite tool, so I did some digging—and I learned it is an embedded AI feature that’s been around for a while. It promises to improve “fluency,” “phrasing,” and “readability,” according to a Microsoft blog. It’s certainly an AI-tool, but my student did not know this. After all, it was embedded in her word processing program along with grammar and spelling tools.
I can envision instances where using this tool could be strategic for my multilingual international students—and also where it could lead to charges of cheating. As I thought about the growing number of tools and services available to student writers—as well as my own inability to keep up with these tools—I thought I might reconsider my AI disclosure policy.
So, for the students’ second major project in the FYC course, I have asked all students to include a disclosure statement on the cover page of the project. In that statement, they should list all the tools and resources they used to develop the project, whether AI-tools, citation generators, graphic templates, translators, image generators, or even spell-checkers (for this first round). I’m also asking them to include disclosures (or acknowledgements) for human help—our writing fellows, the writing center, parents, or even peers who read over the paper. I gave them some model statements to follow:
- I used Google Translate to help me ___________________ in this project.
- I used MetaAI to create an image of ________________ to illustrate the second term in my project.
- I used my Canva account to design the poster presentation for this project.
- Kady J, my writing fellow, helped me organize my last three paragraphs.
- My groupmates Dani R. and Mari T. gave me suggestions on how to make the third section longer.
I am sure other instructors are doing similar things—in fact, I found some similar guidance from Cummings Graduate Institute. For me, the broader form of disclosure and acknowledgement (not just AI) alleviates the pressure of determining what is and is not a form of AI, as well as what counts as an acceptable or strategic resource as opposed to cheating. In fact, these disclosures may encourage students to expand their use of resources as their strategies are validated in feedback and conferences.
Moreover, I have assured students that if they disclose their tools during the various drafting and revising stages—such that we can discuss and address anything that is not appropriate before they submit the final portfolio—they are not going to be penalized or find themselves facing accusations of cheating. While such disclosures do not eliminate the possibility of AI misuse or cheating, if students engage in the drafting process with disclosures throughout, I think we are inviting on-going conversations to support their linguistic and rhetorical development. Ultimately, students will see a record of collaboration, multimodality, and rhetorical strategy—all of which may become transferable resources for future writing.
Photo by Igor Omilaev on Unsplash
