AUC's AI policy

At AUC, both students and staff can use AI in their studies. Responsible use of AI is guided by clear rules and expectations to ensure it supports learning while maintaining academic integrity.

AI Tools in Coursework:

Students can choose to use AI tools in their coursework and assignments. If you want to use AI, you are strongly encouraged to use UvA AI Chat. UvA AI Chat is an in-house tool that offers a safer alternative to commercial models, providing stronger protection for the data and privacy of UvA students and staff. The tool functions in much the same way and is just as user-friendly as commercial models such as ChatGPT, Gemini or Claude. Everything you type stays within the UvA environment and is not permanently shared with commercial or foreign parties, and your prompts are only used in anonymised form to improve the system. Because the UvA controls how data are stored, processed and protected, the tool can be tailored to study and teaching needs while remaining independent from commercial influence.

When you use AI to support your learning, always follow the principles for responsible use outlined below to avoid fraud.

Lecturer's Discretion:

Lecturers have the authority to restrict the use of AI tools for specific assessments or activities. Such restrictions must be clearly stated in the course manual. Lecturers are encouraged to explain why and how AI use might interfere with your ability to meet particular learning objectives. If you decide to use GenAI even though your lecturer has restricted such use, this is considered fraud.

Optional use:

Lecturers are allowed to design courses and assignments that expect you to use AI tools. However, you cannot be required to create an account for, or use, commercial AI tools that are not licensed by the UvA (for example, ChatGPT). If a course activity or assessment involves such tools, you have the right to opt out, and your lecturer must offer you a reasonable alternative way to complete the work. UvA AI Chat is different: it is a UvA-supported tool with appropriate privacy and safety safeguards, so lecturers may require you to use UvA AI Chat as part of your studies.

Grading:

At AUC, your work will not be uploaded into generative AI tools to judge or grade it, and AI cannot be used to independently evaluate your assignments. Feedback must come from your lecturer, based on their own professional expertise. They may use AI as a writing assistant to polish or refine feedback, but only if they carefully check what the AI suggests and take full responsibility for the final comments they share with you.

When is AI use at AUC considered fraud

AUC recognises that AI tools provide both opportunities and obstacles for learning. When used responsibly, these tools can support the learning process and help you achieve the learning objectives of your course. However, your use of for example generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) can also lead to fraud. The precise definitions of fraud can be found in appendix 2 of Academic Standards & Procedures (AS&P) 2026-2027. Basically, AI-fraud means:

• Making use of Artificial Intelligence tools (e.g., UvA AI Chat, ChatGPT, and others) in such a way that it becomes impossible for your lecturer to correctly assess your knowledge, understanding, and/or skills.
  • Example: You make use of GenAI to develop research questions for a proposal but neglect to inform your teacher in a clear and transparent manner how you prompted AI and what you subsequently did with AI output.  
• Making use of Artificial Intelligence tools (e.g., UvA AI Chat, ChatGPT, and others) when your lecturer has explicitly forbidden their use in an assignment, assessment or exam.
  • Example: The lecturer provides you with an assignment to compose a research proposal and wants you to learn how to formulate a strong research question. The course manual explicitly states that you cannot use AI for this assignment, because you must learn the academic skill of developing a strong research question independently. If you still choose to use AI, this is defined as fraud.

When your lecturer suspects unauthorised use of GenAI by students, they must always report this to AUC’s Board of Examiners for further investigation.

Tips for responsible AI use

What it means to use AI tools responsibly can differ from course to course, depending on what your lecturer wants you to learn and how they want you to learn it. This is why it’s always useful to talk with your lecturer about when and how AI is appropriate in their course. It’s also important that you reflect on your own use: what did you use GenAI for (for example, as a study aid, for idea generation, or as an editor), how much did you rely on it, and what did you do with the output? Think about how this has influenced your understanding of the material and your development of skills, and whether AI helped or limited your learning.

In general, the following tips designed by the Advanced Research Writing course coordinators provide useful guidelines.

• Use (generative) AI technology to support your writing, in ways similar to how you use internet search engines, grammar and spell checkers, and (online) dictionaries and thesauruses.
• Use generative AI as a source of information and to generate content. Use tools as assistants, not as authors of your work. Generative AI can perform and can even take over certain tasks for you, but you should remain in charge of the overall writing and thinking processes at all times. This means you need to use generative AI critically and responsibly. Do not take over information generated by generative AI tools unthinkingly. And do not incorporate generated output into your text immediately and without acknowledgments. In short, be smart, not lazy.
• If you use generative AI tools, you must provide full transparency about you use them. When you use generative AI to brainstorm ideas, to grammar-check, style-check, and/or enhance your writing, to generate content (including outlines, larger sections of text, or bibliographies), or any other uses, you should explain your approach clearly and in sufficient detail. You can do so, for instance, in an explanatory footnote or as part of a methodology section. It is also possible to save and provide your lecturer with full access to your chat history for a project.
• Treat output generated by AI similar to other sources of information you use in your academic work. When you incorporate information presented to you by a chatbot, you must summarise, paraphrase, and/or quote it, attribute it clearly and provide a correct citation. Any form of literal copying and pasting without full source attribution is considered fraud. This includes paraphrasing quotes generated by GenAI and presenting these as your own work.
• Familiarise yourself with the advantages, disadvantages and potential risks of using AI, including ethical & sustainability concerns.

AI literacy at AUC

AI has a significant environment footprint due to the energy consumed by large language models. In addition, (ethical) concerns have been raised about how AI tools are developed and training, and about privacy and data security. Researchers are also investigating the impact of AI use on learning and, for example, on the development of your critical thinking skills.

AUC is focusing on enhancing AI literacy of both students and lecturers. Several Academic Core courses already contain AI-components to teach students about the possibilities and limitations of AI, about when AI use might be helpful or unsuitable, and about sustainability and ethics.

Of course, AI is not a replacement for independent thinking, writing, or research. We teach you to use AI responsibly to support your learning, not to undermine it. Working independently, thinking critically and, for example, distinguishing fact from fiction remain key skills.

In coming years, AUC’s curriculum will enhance such components to ensure all students are well-prepared for professional life after graduation, in which AI will inevitably play a role. Lecturers are supported in enhancing the AI-robustness of their courses and understanding the impact of AI on pedagogy and assessment, through a variety of workshops and trainings.

Further Reading