Authentic Authority?

In my current role I am facilitating a digital skills bootcamp with the lovely Town Square and have been topping up my accreditor skills ready for the Graphic Design for Small Business module.

We were reminded of the VACSR acronym where we need to be happy that the work shown is Valid, Authentic, Current, Sufficient and Reliable. The word “Authentic” has been tickling my brain since.

With the rise of AI, learners are able to quickly produce a piece of work that fulfils success criteria, that hits all necessary objectives and are able to hand it to their assessors as a fait-du-complet. What do we think, is this a problem?

For me, it depends on the purpose of the task. Did we want to cause the creation of a photograph, or essay and that’s all we needed? Or did we want more than that? Usually it’s the latter.

Simon Sinek, who always succeeds in making me think deeply about things, said this in his podcast with Cal Fussman:

"Google's kind of like your high school library or Library of Congress is probably more accurate. Like it's got one of everything. You have to go searching, but it just gives you the book…

Whereas AI is, okay, I've read the book for you. I'm going to tell you all about the book you are interested in reading. And here's the best part. I've read every other book, too, and I can tell you what's important that you need to know.

And so it's like the librarian instead of going to the card catalog… you just sit down with the librarian… 'Can I ask you a question about… this topic' and you don't even have to worry about which book was read. You didn't have to worry about it. I'll just tell you what the book said.

…it's doing the work whereas before Google didn't do the work. It just gave you the book.

…But what it's missing is that the choreographer becomes better at understanding the human body from producing the dance themselves. That the painter is better understanding color and life, their own life from doing the painting. It's the struggle that makes us a better version of ourselves, not the product.

And so, yes, everybody can do all the things, but you're not growing as a person. And the question is, do you want to grow? …That is in a capsule the infinite game… are you going to grow?"

I agree wholeheartedly with this line of thinking. I want to grow and learn from each task, not just have it to hand made by the librarian-robot. But let’s be realistic. There will be lots of learners that will throw the task into ChatGPT or Claude.ai and just hand you whatever comes out without thinking too much about it.

The assessor’s responsibility is to feel confident that the learner truly has authored the content they are providing you. That the work is authentic, that the learning part of the process has been fulfilled. There are lots of methods by which you can pick up clues if AI was used. I asked ChatGPT and this is what it said!

"To check if a learner’s work was written by AI, start by using AI detection tools like GPTZero, Copyleaks, or Turnitin’s AI checker—though they’re not always accurate. Look for signs such as an overly formal tone, repetitive phrasing, vague content, or flawless grammar with shallow logic. Compare the style with the learner’s past work; a sudden jump in quality or tone may be a red flag. Ask the learner to explain parts of their work—if they struggle, it could suggest they didn’t write it. Also, run a plagiarism check, as AI content might be mixed with copied text. No method is foolproof, so use a combination of tools, your professional judgment, and student follow-ups before making any conclusions. Always approach with care to ensure fairness."

Really, I feel that the way to be confident in the authenticity of produced essays, resumes, spreadsheets and more is to get clever with the task you set.

Say you are trying to employ a member of staff that can interact well with customers and present as friendly and professional. Don’t rely on a CV that could have keywords thrown out by generative AI – ask for a video call or video presentation where you get to see their tone and manner for yourself.

Maybe you want a piece of digital art from students. Ask for the various iterations of the piece of work annotated with the learning journey at each stage. Ask to see the work in situ in the programme before it has been flattened into a JPEG.

Learners shouldn’t be blamed for being inclined to use the tools that they have at hand, of course they will. We need to be up to date and responsible for setting clear expectations for how they interact with these things. If they’ve used AI as a research tool, make them include the prompt in their citations so we can see the information has been included in stimulus for writing instead of being copy and pasted over.

As very often is the case, knowing what you want to achieve is key to deciding the best activity for each task. Don’t imagine that you can ignore the existence of AI or any other developments that turn up, as our learners certainly won’t.