Student Perspectives on Generative AI Policy

Role: Research Assistant | Jan 2025-Sept 2025 | Dr. Yasmine Kotturi, Human Centered Computing

A participatory design study where students co-created AI policies and redesigned generative AI tools to better support design education.

Research Questions

Problem Statement

R1: How do students perceive AI integration into a design course?

R2: How can student-driven policies inform generative AI use in classroom settings?

With the increasing integration of generative AI in education, policies governing its use are often created without direct student input. This gap can lead to policies that do not align with students' needs or learning experiences. This project aims to address this issue by developing student-authored AI policies that balance innovation, ethical use, and academic integrity. By understanding how students perceive AI and its role in their coursework, this research provides actionable insights that can inform future AI policies in design education..

Users & Audiences

Students in HCC629: Fundamentals of Human-Centered Computing. The findings benefit university administrators, educators, policymakers, and future students in design courses.

Process

Recruitment & Consent: Screening surveys, participant consent
Workshop 1 (3/28/2025): Brainstorming policy recommendations through candid conversations
- Students shared personal GenAI use experiences in class, raising concerns about unclear ethical boundaries and academic integrity by employing Think-Pair-Share activity
- A UMBC AI committee member presented campus-wide survey data, followed by students selecting policy topics to explore further
Workshop 2 (4/11/2025): Curating policy recommendations through student-authored zine making
- Students critiqued peer-drafted policies to reduce redundancy and make them more concrete and actionable
- Students refined their statements and expressed them through physical and digital zines
Workshop 3 (4/25/2025): Applying policy recommendations through interface redesign activity
- Students reviewed and critiqued each other's zines, then selected a GenAI tool to redesign
- Students' redesigns incorporated metaphors and HCC 629 learning objectives to support their proposed policies
Data Analysis: Conduct qualitative and quantitative analysis on surveys, discussions, and interviews

My Role

led three workshops with 8 participants, who were peers recruited from my HCC629 course from the previous semester
helped design activities that fostered candid discussions and guided students in policy writing, including a Think-Pair-Share exercise to reflect on AI use in design classrooms
developed scaffolds to support their work and collaborated on creating policy topics and guiding questions based on literature about AI in design education
contributed to the core research process, assisting with IRB protocol development, data collection, and data analysis.

Next Steps

Complete qualitative analysis of workshop transcripts and interviews
Finalize and circulate the curated zines on campus
Present findings in research paper

Outcomes

To be determined. Stay tuned!