Student’s parents sue school over discipline for using AI on project

By Neal Riley, Mike Sullivan

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    HINGHAM, Massachusetts (WBZ) — Parents of a Hingham High School student are suing their son’s school administrators and teachers after he was disciplined for using artificial intelligence on a project.

The lawsuit filed in federal court by Dale and Jennifer Harris says the student suffered from “arbitrary grading” and was not selected to the National Honor Society “because of this alleged academic integrity violation.” The parents said the school’s student handbook does not spell out a policy for AI use, so it’s not fair to punish him for it.

The lawsuit calls on the court to order the school to raise the student’s Social Studies grade to a “B” and remove any academic sanction related to AI use from his record. They also don’t want his use of AI to be characterized as “cheating” or “academic dishonesty.”

“He is applying to elite colleges and universities given his high level of academic and personal achievement,” the lawsuit states. “Absent the grant of an injunction by this Court, the Student will suffer irreparable harm that is imminent.”

“This is a kid I really believe can do anything he wants,” said mother Jenifer Harris. “He is looking at some of the top schools in the country and his top-notch school, his first choice, is Stanford.”

Harris is a writer, and the boy’s father is a teacher. In one of his honors courses, he was paired with another student. They were assigned to do a paper on a famous person and their civil actions. He and his partner chose Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. During the process, they used AI to generate notes and to create an outline, not to write the paper itself. WBZ-TV asked Harris if she thought this was cheating.

“Absolutely not. First of all, the school had no policy on it yet,” details Harris.

“I know my son defended himself to the school saying AI is not cheating, and it’s not plagiarism. He said if you look it up, it’s well documented that AI is the property of the person who generated it,” said Harris.

In response, the school had the two students redo the assignment separately and on a different topic.

“We found out in the court documents that they were never going to give him a grade higher than a 65, which is odd because the other kid got a 75 on his paper,” continues Harris.

As a result of the incident, her son hasn’t been able to complete college applications due to the unresolved nature of the situation. It’s blocked him from early or rolling admissions at major schools.

However, the NHS has reconsidered its decision.

“We have already gotten something out of it, which is his induction into the National Honors Society,” said the family’s attorney Peter Farrell.

Farrell said the organization originally denied him because of the AI situation. He said an investigation showed seven other accepted students had disciplinary actions, including the use of AI. The organization has since let him re-apply.

The lawsuit names the superintendent, school administrators, social studies teachers and the Hingham School committee as defendants. A spokesperson for Hingham Public Schools said the district would not be commenting on the lawsuit “to respect the privacy of the student involved and due to ongoing litigation.”

The student’s parents also want the court to order the defendants “to undergo training in the use and implementation of artificial intelligence in the classroom, schools and educational environment.”

CBS News reported last year that while some school districts have banned students from using tools like ChatGPT, other educators are encouraging students to use AI functions to do their work.

“The reason why is because the MBA students I teach are going to be entering the workforce in about 10 months, and they’ll often be working within companies and organizations that encourage employees to make use of generative AI tools,” Columbia Business School sociology professor Dan Wang told CBS MoneyWatch.

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