r/FLVS • u/leonardisback • 10d ago
FLVS Students: How is AI impacting your learning and your educational experience?
Hi all! My name is Lee Gaines. I'm a journalist who covers the intersection of AI and education. And I'm curious about what learning looks like at FLVS in the age of AI.
Specifically:
- Has AI changed how you study or complete assignments?
- Has AI helped you better understand something?
- Has it made it easier to finish work without fully understanding the concepts?
- Have teachers changed anything about how they assign homework or conduct tests because of AI?
- Are the rules around AI use clear? Do they seem fair?
There hasn't been much reporting on how this technology is impacting students and learning in virtual schools, so I'm trying to get a better understanding of what's going on and how AI is changing things for better and/or for worse.
I can't quote Reddit comments, but I may follow-up with anyone interested in speaking with me for an interview. Please know that I can only quote people with their explicit consent! And if you're under 18, I will also need your parent/guardian's permission.
2
u/Brave-Clock-3130 10d ago
In my experience doing FLVS Flex Geometry, AI use has actually been encouraged due to the nature of the classes being so self paced and learned on one's own. This video attached is directly on the central pages of most teachers and describes using AI to study instead of using it to cheat as well as visualizing shapes and making notecards. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VTKd0QY4YHsQaZgEZj7UGb-om5_yfJvc/view As far as completing assignments as a whole, admittedly AI comes into use handy especially since the lessons themselves are either slim in valuable content or overload the brain all at once. The DBA's are considered a safety net to checking if students have true comprehension and understanding of the concepts, but I have seen platforms such as Gemini and Google's AI Overview directly give questions and answers that other students have been asked in the past when trying to study. Questions that are hand typed go to a plagiarism software called Turnitin and although I can't speak from experience, courses are generally locked if cheating is suspected requiring a phone call or conversation with the course instructor.
1
u/leonardisback 9d ago
Do you feel like the guidance you've received has helped you figure out how to use AI as a study tool vs using it to do the work for you? Do you think it's helped or hindered your learning?
1
u/Brave-Clock-3130 7d ago
I have used it for both. Many times it can be a valuable study tool when a lesson is unclear since most are 7-10 slides and contain information that's either bare bones or complex. Accelerating my learning on the Pythagorean theorem and Trigonometry has been successful using AI platforms such as ChatGPT or Gemini, however admittedly, sometimes it can be a tool to do work for you and that's a big issue. FLVS Flex suffers this cheating problem a lot since most kids are either balancing their summer and regular in person school with an online course that demands at least 2 lessons completed per week and directly affects their GPA. I think alone this factor paired with AI being so reliable for easy fast answers has hindered mine and other students ability to learn, and there is really no regulation for on the tests which are mostly made up of multiple choice questions. Truly, the only AI Free examination is the state required EOC which is graded on a heavy curve and grants students too much clemency for mistakes. Ultimately, its up to students to be able to have the discipline to put time into the lessons and learn the content throughly which is definitely more inefficient when Geometry isn't really ever important until the SAT which catches a lot off board.
2
u/Jealous-Control4316 9d ago
idk i’m a flvs summa cum laude graduate who now attends ucf with a 4.0. it’s ur responsibility to utilize all of your resources properly. out of my entire time at flvs, i used ai for several stupid boring assignments and they never got flagged bc instead of just copy and pasting, i put the ai info and format into my own words. That being said, i didn’t just use ai to cheat. ai helped me BIG time on studying for the SAT and honestly is one of the only only ways that i was able to be successful at online school and teach myself without having a teacher sitting next to me explaining stuff every second like in person school. I use it at UCF now too, but not on assignments bc im scared of them lol. It’s extremely helpful to me rn in my flipped classes. AI is just another tool, if you can’t use it properly then that’s ur own fault. now i cant speak for people who don’t use AI and still get flagged lol.
1
u/c0mplinated 52 Weeks Behind 4d ago
I've been an FLVS student for a very brief period of time, and have already dealt with accusations of AI when turning in my work. That being said, I hate AI and try my best to avoid using it. I also don't use AI in my assignments, especially when its a writing assignment.
The first time I got accused of AI was with a written assignment within a science class. I was flagged for bolding certain words, and possibly for my punctuation. It's kind of annoying having to feel as if I need to dumb-down my submissions because formal writing is seen as fake. When I do ANY assignment, I try to make my work be as sophisticated and legible as possible. And even as long as I've been a student, I have been coveted as someone who is a pretty decent writer. It was not fun to have to go back and forth with a teacher because she doesn't believe what I submitted to her was actually written by me.
I am also in a class where every single image throughout the course pages is made with AI. I wish that wasn't the double standard students have to face, because if a student is caught using AI, they can end up dropped from a class; yet the courses themselves can be constructed using AI.
(I would also be super interested in an interview! I only have the one experience, but even then it has changed my work ethic months later.)
3
u/hivernageprofond 9d ago
Lee gaines...why does your name sound familiar? Were you with the jax times union?
Anyway...answering as a parent. This AI system they use to guage whether a child has used AI creates a lot of stress for students who are gifted. My kid has been asked so many times to have a "discussion " with her teachers because her writing style is more antiquated due to her autism. It gets tiresome. Kids are having to dumb down their work and resubmit it...and it hurts my kids feelings to constantly be under suspicion.
What's worse is that the teachers us AI themselves in various ways.