(TNS) — Eleanor Canina is a harsh critic of AI for a 15-year-old, so she was surprised when her English teacher gave her a failing grade for allegedly using AI to complete an essay assignment.
Kanina and her mother, Stacey DeCoster, are working to clear her name and protect other students from false accusations of AI use. The pair argue that Wake County teachers should not rely on AI detectors, which are known to inaccurately tell that work was generated by AI.
“We can’t just leave people using AI in their assignments,” Kanina, 15, a freshman at Green Hope High School in Cary, said in an interview with The News & Observer. “But to be honest, I think the number one priority is to prevent people from being accused of crimes they’re not guilty of.”
Due to student privacy rules, Wake County Schools did not respond directly to the family’s accusations. However, the district said in a statement Thursday that it recognizes the use of artificial intelligence in education as a new and rapidly evolving field.
“Our core responsibility is teaching and learning,” Wake said in a statement. “Teachers must be able to accurately assess student work in order to understand progress and adjust instruction as needed. At the same time, we have a duty to ensure that student work is assessed fairly and consistently.”
Growing concerns about student use of AI
The use of AI by students to receive credit for their work is a growing concern for K-12 schools and higher education institutions. The N&O previously reported that in 2024, the state Department of Public Instruction issued guidelines for the use of AI in North Carolina public schools.
Kanina recognizes the dangers of AI. Both because of the impact data centers have on the environment and the ethical issues of using them without doing the work yourself.
“It’s preventing people from thinking freely, and using that as an easy excuse to get away from work doesn’t help anyone in the long run,” Canina said.
When Canina saw online last week that she had earned a “0” on her English I assignment on the first act of “Romeo and Juliet,” she didn’t see it coming. The gradebook included a note from the teacher that said, “Evidence of AI, please try again.”
That was the only bad mark on a screen filled with 100-point grades for her various classes.
DeCoster said she was worried there would be problems throughout the school year because her daughter’s English I teacher resigned. A long-term substitute teacher observes the lessons, but assignments are graded by other teachers who don’t know how the students write.
Teachers relied on AI detectors
Mr. DeCoster and Mr. Canina immediately raised their concerns with the English teacher, whose name was not published by the N&O.
Ms. DeCoster suggested that the teacher compare the assigned text with her daughter’s past work. She also suggested that the teacher look at her daughter’s Google Doc history to make sure her daughter was creating material rather than cutting and pasting it.
Instead, teachers said they used three different AI assessment tools to complete the assignment.
“The results showed a 62 percent, 75 percent, and 87 percent likelihood of AI generation or significant AI assistance,” the teacher said in an email to DeCoster provided to The N&O.
But DeCoster, a sociology professor at North Carolina State University, said there is widespread evidence that AI detectors gave false positives. That’s why DPI’s guidelines state that schools should “use AI detectors with extreme caution.”
According to DPI’s AI guidelines, “AI detectors have been proven to be unreliable and should never be used as the sole factor in determining whether a student has ‘cheated.'” “A common problem with AI detectors is a high frequency of false positives for non-native English speakers and creative writers, and a high frequency of false positives for students who are skilled at working with AI and can fool the detector.”
In February, multiple media outlets reported that a New York state judge ruled in favor of an Adelphi University student accused of plagiarism based on a professor’s use of an AI detector.
Mr Wake said it is following DPI’s AI guidance and providing ongoing support to schools regarding the appropriate use of AI in instruction and assessment.
“The district does not provide or require the use of AI detection tools, instead encouraging educators to rely on multiple means to inform their professional judgment, including reviewing students’ writing processes and work history,” Wake said.
Petition for rules on the use of AI detectors
“We understand and acknowledge your concerns regarding the limitations and variability of AI detection tools,” the teacher said in an email to DeCoster.
But the teacher said he was “relying on the evidence available” given the unique circumstances of not teaching Mr. Canina’s class in person. The teacher offered to give Kanina an alternative assignment, but the family refused.
Green Hope has since offered to have another English teacher grade Kanina’s first assignment. But that’s not enough for new students and their mothers, who argue that this solution doesn’t solve the fundamental problem of teachers’ reliance on AI detectors.
Kanina created an online petition calling for “responsible use of AI detection tools at Green Hope High School.” Her points include putting safeguards in place to protect students from being harmed by erroneous results.
Are AI detection tools stifling creativity?
One of the posters for Kanina’s online petition said the teacher accused the teacher of using AI after the detection tool noted that the assignment had “rich vocabulary and few grammatical errors.”
Ms. DeCoster said one of her friends was worried that her child would be accused of using AI because she is a good writer.
In Canina’s case, DeCoster suspects her daughter was flagged by the teacher’s AI detection tool because she used terms like “title character.” Kanina is an avid reader and writer with a highly developed vocabulary.
“Right now, she’s writing this book worrying about the possibility of being falsely accused,” DeCoster said in an interview. “So I don’t know if I should say to her, ‘Please dim the lights and write at a lower level so I don’t get warned.'”
Kanina, who is currently reading “The Handmaid’s Tale,” said she is not deterred by the AI accusations.
“I’m not going to change the way I write in response to this kind of injustice,” Kanina said. “So it’s not that I have to change, I want the system to change.”
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