UNILAG to Unveil AI Ethics Policy to Curb Plagiarism 

Funmi Ogundare

The management of the University of Lagos (UNILAG) is set to unveil a policy document on the ethical use of artificial intelligence in academic activities.

The move is aimed at enhancing critical thinking rather than fostering plagiarism and academic indolence.

The Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academics and Research), Prof. Bola Oboh, stated this recently at the opening ceremony of a three-day workshop on ‘Higher Education Ethics’, facilitated by a Fulbright Specialist awardee and Deputy Ethics Officer at Texas A&M University, Central Texas, USA, Prof. Russell Porter, and organised by the Office of International Relations, Partnerships and Prospects (IRPP) of UNILAG.

Oboh described the training as sacrosanct, emphasising the importance of ethics in the tertiary education sector.

Speaking with journalists, she highlighted the university’s commitment to maintaining ethical standards and ongoing efforts to develop policy documents to address ethical concerns for artificial intelligence use in academic works. 

She noted that the application of AI in academia is inevitable. Academic institutions globally must ensure that the tools only aid the intellectual endowments of users and do not disrupt quality academic standards.

“If we say no to AI, we will just be deceiving ourselves. So, we have already started developing policies in that area as a university. In the next one or two months, I’m sure the policy will be finally taken to the senate for consideration,” said Oboh.

She added, “Whether we like it or not, our students are already using it, and some lecturers are also using it to check for plagiarised works. So we have made the student realise that while they can use AI, the idea of being able to think critically, using their thoughts and mind, should not be thrown away. It is when you just pick things online and dump them as received that it becomes a serious ethical problem.”

She said that when the AI policy is finally adopted, it will enhance critical thinking rather than fostering plagiarism and laziness among staff and students.

Prof. Porter described the ethical considerations surrounding using AI and Machine Learning (ML) in research and academic work as a global concern.

He recalled a previous conference held at UNILAG, where he discussed AI ethics and reiterated the importance of carefully implementing AI tools to avoid ethical and legal violations.

He acknowledged ongoing research works across the world in this area and the need for continuous vigilance and adaptation. 

During one of the sessions, Dr. Babatunde Sawyer, the Research Lead,  at Machine Intelligence Research Group (MIRG) and a lecturer at the Department of Computer Science, UNILAG,  addressed participants on AI, its accountability, validity, reliability, explainability, security and privacy.

At a similar workshop held at the Arthur Mbanefo Digital Research Centre (AMDRC), the training, according to the university, was aimed at upscaling the knowledge of faculty members in ways and methods of proactive ethics as well as inculcating its indispensability in promoting standards while also driving excellent service delivery. The programme, part of the expected output of Porter’s scholarship award, was a presentation of the Proactive Ethics Programme (PEP), an initiative the scholar developed through his research works.

Through the PEP initiative, the workshop aims to equip the administrative and academic staff of the university with the necessary knowledge and frameworks to address ethical issues in higher education.

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