Skip to content
NTW2029 - Home

GenAI policy

Summary of the GenAI policy

  • You are free to use or not use GenAI chatbots in this course in any way as long as you submit links to your chat transcripts
  • There is no penalty for using GenAI chatbots
  • Every assignment in this course must include either 1) a link to a transcript of all relevant GenAI use or 2) a statement that no GenAI was used to receive credit.

See the rest of the page for important details.

Official policy (includes linked details)

The course’s GenAI policy is: you may use GenAI chatbots (:but only chatbots) for any coursework with no penalty if:

  1. you use a GenAI tool that lets you share a :persistent chat link
  2. you submit :links to all of your chat transcripts along with the assignment

If you use GenAI but don’t submit :the links, you’ve :broken the rules.

You do not need to cite your use of GenAI in assignments in addition to providing your chat links. The links alone are sufficient citation.

Use or non-use of GenAI in this course :will not affect your grade.

Is this a trick? Why would you allow GenAI use?

This permissive GenAI policy is not a trick, or an honesty test, or reverse psychology. The course does not consider use of GenAI to be cheating. GenAI is a tool that all of us will be using more and more. We must learn about its capabilities and limitations.

To that end, after the course is over and grades are in, we will ask students to let us use their chats for research (they will be anonymized, and you can opt-out). Having no penalty for use helps us get :honest data.

There is really no penalty? Even if GenAI does the entire assignment for me?

Obviously, your learning may suffer if you rely too heavily on GenAI to complete your coursework. However, there will be no grade penalty or course policy violation as long as you follow the rules described here.

What counts as GenAI? Can I use any software tool in my coursework?

In this course, Generative AI (hereafter GenAI) includes :tools that generate text and images from prompts.

Course policy only allows use of :chatbots, not other GenAI tools.

What counts as GenAI use?

Everything counts. If you use these these tools :in any way while working on your assignment, consider it GenAI use, and send the link.

Do I have to use GenAI?

No. You are not expected to use GenAI, and it’s fine if you don’t. If you don’t use GenAI on an assignment, you MUST end your submission with the statement, “I did not use GenAI in any way for this assignment.” Please just be honest about it.

Be careful: you must submit links in the right way.

Instructions for ChatGPT:

Note: you cannot share links unless you create an account and are logged in during your chats.

To share the chat, click the share link icon, create a public link, and copy/paste it into your assignment. Here’s a :walkthrough with images.

Don’t make the mistake of :copying the wrong links.

NUS general GenAI policy

GenAI policy in this course should be understood in relation to the :NUS Academic Honesty policy.

Instructor GenAI declaration

I’ve tried to use GenAI to help with teaching preparation and instruction, but so far I haven’t found it very helpful. Nonetheless, I am still interested in experimenting with this possibility, so for the sake of transparency, I’m letting you know that I might use AI in the following ways:

  • generate questions for in-class activities or optional (ungraded) online quizzes
  • generate writing examples for discussion or to illustrate my points
  • revise handouts or lecture notes
  • revise online course content, including on Canvas and my course website
  • revise my written feedback on assignments (I write the initial feedback without GenAI and do all final revisions)

:x submit all

Send the entire chat and all chats if you have more than one. We don’t care if it’s 100 pages long.Send it all.

:x chatbots

This course allows use of GenAI chatbots, meaning tools like ChatGPT that use a chat interface—you enter a text prompt and the AI responds with a text output. Any chat input is allowed. You can copy-and-paste your paper into the chat if you like.

These and other GenAI tools also allow non-chatbot interactions, but these are not allowed in this course. With non-chat tools, It is much harder to understand a student’s contribution, see why a student is using the tool, and evaluate the tool’s effects on student learning.

GenAI uses that are not allowed under this course policy include:

  • using GenAI tools integrated into Microsoft Office or Google Docs
  • uploading any file to GenAI
  • prompting the AI to create any output other than plain text
  • downloading any file from GenAI

These uses will be considered violations of NUS academic honesty policies.

:x one chat

For each assignment, try to keep all of your GenAI interactions in one chat just to make it easier to give me the transcripts. However, if you do end up with multiple chats, you must include all of them.

:x no submission

If you use GenAI, but don’t submit the full transcript(s) with your assignment, it will be considered a violation of academic honesty with consequent (serious) penalties.

There really is no penalty for using GenAI, so don’t risk failing the assignment or the course by forgetting to submit all links.

Every assignment must include either a GenAI link or a statement of non-use to earn credit. If neither are included, the assignment will receive a zero.

:x grade

We likely won’t even look at most transcripts during the semester. We will collect them, anonymize them, and analyze them for research purposes after grades are in. Even if we do look at the transcripts, there is no penality for using GenAI in the ways we describe here.

:x honest

Please don’t edit the chats, or worry that you said something dumb in the chats, or try to trick the system, because that would ruin the dataset and undermine our research. All chats will be anonymized before using them for research.

:x GenAI tools

GenAI doesn’t include basic computer-assisted editing like the grammar and spellcheck functions built into word processors.

It includes (but is not limited to) tools such as ChatGPT, Microsoft CoPilot chat, Gemini, Claude, many other tools whose names we don’t know, and home-run LLMs .

:x different tool

I recommended one browser and extension combination, but you are welcome to use others if you can figure them out. If you find something that works, please let me know so we can tell other students.

:x NUS GenAI

Please read NUS guidance on use of AI tools generally 🡕, using AI tools for assignments 🡕, and plagiarism 🡕. Relevant sections of the NUS Code of Student Conduct are here 🡕.

:x persistent

When you use a chatbot, the information isn’t necessarily saved in a way that you can share the chat with others. ChatGPT lets you create a link that will persist for at least several days if not weeks. If you want to use a different chatbot, you must confirm that it will let you share a link that will let others see the chat. The link might work on your computer, where the website saves data in your browser, but not on someone else’s computer.

:x details

First, click the share link icon:

share link icon

Then, click the create link button to create a public link:

create link

Finally, click the copy link button to create a public link we can see:

copy link

Don’t highlight and copy/paste the URL from your browser—it will take you to the chat, but it won’t work for your instructor:

don't copy url link

You might also see a copy link option in ChatGPT, but this is a link to a GPT builder, not to your chat.

don't copy this link

:x any way

It doesn’t matter if:

  • you just ask the tool to check your spelling
  • you ask questions and the tool’s output is totally unhelpful
  • you are just testing the tool to see if it will be helpful and you decide that it’s not

Send the link! There is no penalty for use. Follow course policy.