AI (Artificial Intelligence) is here to stay.
From language translation to medical diagnosis, and from fraud detection to weather forecasting, we now live our lives entwined with AI. The utility of these examples alone – of which there are myriad more – undoubtedly reflect the harnessing of computational power for civilisational good.
But when it comes to creative work or customer service, for example, there are few artists who revel in the total automation of their vision, and hardly a soul preferring to speak to a machine than an “actual person”.
The application of AI in educational settings, however – including its cognitive, developmental, ethical, and social implications – is not black and white. It requires critical mediation by both educators and students alike. Pure pessimism – such as that of the mid-19th-century critics who thought photography would kill art – is to be ignorant of Heraclitus’ truism that “the only constant is change”. Conversely, unthinking implementation of “the latest thing” is a sure path to societal destruction.
Since time immemorial, educators have deliberated over the meanings and utilities of texts and material cultures, as well as the processes by which such knowledge is transferred. Now, and with urgency, they must focus a discerning eye onto the AI-driven tools of information retrieval and content generation. Educators must instil in their students a sense of when and why it might be propitious to turn to AI, remaining cognisant of the short- and long-term gains and pains.
The Global Shift Towards AI in Education
From independent schools to world-leading universities, institutions are grappling with how to meaningfully integrate AI into their academic programmes.
In the US, The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is leading the way, offering programs that go beyond technical skills, such as coding, in order to consider behavioural and economic effects. In the UK, employers increasingly demand AI literacy, and so schools and universities must take notice by weaving AI into their curricula without undermining the individual.
Some institutions embed ethics at the core of this transition, encouraging students to examine the wider impact of artificial intelligence. In early 2025, the University of Oxford launched a five-year partnership with OpenAI, aimed at advancing research and education through cutting-edge AI tools. This partnership marks a significant step in integrating AI into academia and technology-enhanced research. At the same time, Oxford maintains a clear stance on responsible AI use, equipping staff and students with guidance that uphold transparency and accountability – values that have long shaped the University’s academic ethos. Some UK universities now encourage students to incorporate AI in their assignments and then critically evaluate the results, turning a potential academic crutch into a valuable learning experience.
The growing presence of AI in UK classrooms underscores the country’s historic role as a standard-bearer in education: ‘adaptive learning systems’ adjust content and difficulty based on a student’s performance; ‘feedback tools’ such as Grammarly help students with structure, syntax, and spelling, while Turnitin can be used to detect plagiarism; and ‘virtual assistants’ help with dictation and voice-activated learning.
Such approaches are a far cry from a caricaturist reliance on ChatGPT, but with such great power comes even greater responsibility.
What Meaningful Integration Looks Like
As AI becomes an integral part of the broader learning environment, educators must ensure that students, as well as themselves, use such technologies responsibly and not merely as tools to sidestep original thinking.
According to the Head of Business Development at Think Tutors, there are 5 elements which users of large language models (LLMs) must consider:
1. Sense of Self
As with almost anything in life, outsourcing agency when unnecessary leads to personal diminishment. For example, using a calculator out of pure laziness, when an equation is well within one’s abilities, contributes to cognitive decline. Similarly, using LLMs for content generation is to suppress one’s skills of imagination, conceptualisation, synthesis, pattern recognition, abstraction, and thinking – both critical and lateral.
2. Scope of Endeavour
Users should have a strong sense of the boundaries surrounding what they are seeking to achieve before asking any questions. One must be mindful of succumbing to the temptations of suggested courses of action once initial tasks have been fulfilled. In accordance with the above, users should remain mindful of where their individualism is being eroded.
3. Reliability
While LLMs are improving at an alarming rate, their lack of consciousness leaves them reliant on amalgamating information from sources without the power of intuition. If users seek rough answers to questions of limited significance, then using an LLM may be prudent. However, if users seek accurate answers to questions of significance, then they are wise to cross-examine primary and secondary sources.
4. Time
LLMs constitute excellent tools for expediting information retrieval. However, in this dopaminergic age of mass marketing, one must strive to avoid the distractions concomitant with AI systems.
5. Human Touch
Users must not forget the physical and social skills that are negatively impacted as a byproduct of shifting interaction online. In the long-term, recreation and procreation may be more important than mere information.
The Think Tutors Perspective
An education is not something merely delivered. From the Latin ‘to lead out’, it is something nurtured out of an individual with the requisite qualities. It is cultivated – personally and socially, by way of expert guidance, via the academy and technology – on its way to being realised. So, as debates rage over its implications, we see AI not as a trend but as a turning point.
In an age where LLMs can write stories in seconds, it’s our role to awaken the individual.
In an age of automation, it’s our role to remind students that creativity is inherently a struggle.
In an age of atomisation, it’s our role to foreground the human experience.
In an age of noise, it’s our role to provide nothing but bespoke education.
By blending technological skills with critical thinking and moral sensibility, we (Think Tutors) prepare students to become conscientious and informed innovators of tomorrow.