Ed & Tech must-reads 090925

The wicked problem of AI and assessment from Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education

Just for something different I thought I would start off with something from the world of GenAI. My Deakin colleagues Corbin, Bearman, Boud and Dawson (it does make me a little happy being able to say this) apply the ‘wicked problem’ framework to considering how screwed we really are when it comes to AI and assessment. They interviewed 20 teaching academics about their practice and found that, yes, it is in fact a wicked problem (by all 10 definitions of one). I would love to see some research asking third space practitioners like learning designers, ed techs and academic developers, who work with dozens of teaching academics on the reg about their perspectives and experiences. The paper calls for greater flexibility in approaches.

Near future academic publishing – a speculative social science fiction experiment from Learning, Media and Technology

This editorial marking the 20th anniversary of this journal (in this form) came out at the end of last year and offers a novel set of predictions for academic publishing in the next 5 and 10 years. It discusses a shift to an expectation of 7 day turn around for reviews, the proliferation of GenAI slop, boycotts of commercial publishers and the marginalisation of research. It ends on a mildly optimistic note and is worth the brief read.

Anthropic Agrees to Pay $1.5 Billion to Settle Lawsuit With Book Authors from The New York Times

I’ve long maintained that the outcome of GenAI will come down to the money. So I’ve been keeping an eye on stories like this. As with most legal cases, the eye-watering sums being bandied around at one point for settlements (in the capital T trillions) haven’t eventuated but the admission of liability keeps the issue bubbling along. I think the authors are getting stiffed currently, at $3000 for each book. More to see on this matter though I’m sure.