By The Editorial Board

With another whirlwind of a fall semester already underway, some of you might have already hit that all-too-familiar wall. Opening up Canvas and seeing a list of assignments longer than the SUB Chick-fil-A line at lunchtime is enough to send anyone into a panic.

College is a lot. You’re attempting to navigate independence while juggling the overwhelming fear of falling behind. Multiple classes, jobs, clubs and organizations – sometimes it feels like there aren’t enough hours in a day.

So when the semester gets tough and the assignments become endless, it’s no surprise many turn to familiar shortcuts. We’re human after all.

A 2025 report by Statista found that 86% of educational institutions already utilize generative artificial intelligence in lesson plans or teaching, and the percentage of students using it in classroom settings shot up by 26% since 2023.

Generative AI’s like ChatGPT and Grok have filled in a lot of blanks for us in recent years – it’s been a list maker, homework helper, search engine and even a personal therapist for some.

With this technological power at the tips of our fingers, many find themselves caught between remaining wary of the true power of AI and embracing it completely. In the education sector, it seems to lean toward the latter.

The business school just recently launched its AI Venture Challenge – an undergraduate competition designed to promote the utilization of AI-integrated tools in various business ventures. When we look a little broader around campus, we see another interesting dichotomy of AI usage, which seems to vary by department and individual professors as well.

Some departments encourage AI integration, while some professors ban it completely. Despite these departmental discrepancies, AI continues to reach educational institutions and students around the world.

Although the future of AI might look uncertain in the classroom, we want to instill in you a little more confidence in what we do here at the Lariat.

Every piece of content we put out, whether it’s a news story, sports feature, arts & life review or opinion column, is all written by real, human students, just like you.

We sit next to you in class, walk past you on Fountain Mall and are the representation of what you care about in the news. Only a human can properly convey the electricity on campus during All-University Sing season or the first ‘Sic ’em’ back in McLane Stadium – and our writers bring that to life with every word they write.

We publish with the same passion for Baylor as you have, and more importantly, we publish with your best interests in mind. While we might not be able to write a news story in 10 seconds like ChatGPT can, we are real students who care about the same issues you do – which is reflected throughout the Lariat.

Keeping this in mind, we aren’t here to tell you that AI is evil and should never be used. To the contrary, artificial intelligence does propose a unique opportunity to help us work more efficiently.

But with great power comes great responsibility. So if you are planning on using generative AI for your educational pursuits this year, here are some of our recommendations for using it effectively and appropriately.

Use, don’t abuse

Generative AI’s like ChatGPT can be a great resource and starting point for research, outlines, list-making and more. If you’re feeling stuck on a big assignment or struggling to start a paper, AI can be used to fill in some blanks; however, just because you can doesn’t mean you should use ChatGPT to completely write your 10-page final paper. Not only is this a massive violation of Baylor’s Honor Code, but it does you an incredible disservice long-term. While just passing the class with that last paper might feel like the only thing that matters, mastering applicable skills like writing and literacy are irreplaceable in the real world. Future employers might hire someone who got a C+ on a final paper, but they surely won’t hire the ones who took the easy way out because they couldn’t string five sentences together.

Keep it simple

In a recent article about AI and its capabilities, Forbes outlined several more effective ways for AI usage across all sectors – mainly keeping it as simple as possible. If you’re taking organic chemistry and every word the professor says sounds like a different language, AI can be a helpful simplifying resource. Sometimes, you might need a concept explained to you in a slightly different way, which can make all the difference. AI has the potential to make your life easier, but not everything is supposed to be easy – especially college. Our brains have some truly unimaginable power, which we could benefit from turning on every once in a while.

Follow the rules

We know AI is the future, but when you’re a part of an educational institution, company or organization, you live by their rules. If your professor says not to use AI, don’t use it. The consequences of getting caught far outweigh the temporary benefits of getting that assignment done. Despite AI’s slow integration, its use is still considered academic dishonesty in many contexts. When you use AI outside of the careful parameters set by your professor, you not only risk your grade, but also your reputation.

So, coming from a group of creative writers, we urge you to think about the how and the why behind your AI usage. While it’s an efficient resource for busy students, it isn’t a get-out-of-jail-free card. Honesty is always the best policy – and so is doing your own work. The closer we get to our computers is the day we no longer get to experience all of the wonderful parts of being a college student. Lines of code won’t set you apart, but your experiences will.