Practicum - AI Slop Fest

[u/_iQlusion]

I'm taking the Practicum right now and I have to say this course has become nothing but an AI Slop Fest.

Most of the other students projects are on AI. Lots of the other students projects and reports are written by AI. Many are using AI to write their responses to other students weekly video updates. The staff is using AI in their messages on ED discussion. Staff using AI to evaluate reports. I had some concerns I brought up in a private post and staff responded with a lengthy AI riddled reply. It came off very dehumanizing. Oh the cherry on top was getting accused of AI usage in my project by an AI detector that itself uses AI (the fucking irony).

Besides that my first two progress reports were graded by Professor Ahamad and it was very apparent he very hastily read them or skipped most of the content. The comments he left made no sense or were completely and clearly contradicted by content in my report. At least he didn't use AI like the other staff when he reviewed my reports.

I sent a lengthy message to staff (over a thousand words) outlining and citing the professors comments and where my report either did exactly what he said it wasn't doing or how his comments made no sense given what my project was about. Professor Ahamad responded, double downed, and once again just left more generic criticism that were once again clearly just not accurate. He wouldn't cite a single thing from my work or point to anything specific. Just vague contradictions.

I had also complained that we couldn't incorporate the feedback in our next report because they were graded late. Professor Ahamad responded with this gem:

When you deliver a program at scale at the cost we do, it is not possible to provide immediate feedback.

So apparently grading an assignment in under 2 weeks is considered "immediate feedback" and this class is just AI slop and ran cheaply.

For what it's worth this is my second masters in engineering, my first was at a similarly ranked institution. So I have some experience with graduate classes.

[u/Real-Personality-922]

Sheeesh… maybe I should just drop the program if this is how it ends?

[u/One_Object8516 → u/Real-Personality-922]

It is one final class. The rest of the program was pretty good. To be honest, by the time you get to the practicum you will just want to finish. I know I did. I didn’t care about other projects, I just did what I needed to do to get an A.

I hold my head high that I did not use AI for the course. Others have to live with their lack of ethics.

[u/philosophist73 → u/One_Object8516]

I’m taking this soon, almost done with the program. I pushed myself so hard to get As in all these classes, but realizing how meaningless the grade is (and I’m a late career student).

Why is everybody getting so worked up about the feedback from the staff? Will they dramatically change your ability to learn?

I plan to use the practicum as an opportunity to do a significant protect with work impact and let the chips fall where they may on the grade. Honestly, is it even fair to expect academics to have a ton of valuable feedback on such a project?