The Opportunities and Risks of Generative AI for Faculty: The HBCU Experience

• In Event: Sociology of Education Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 5. Navigating AI in the Current Educational landscape

Abstract

Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) has increasingly been adopted in classrooms and academic research. Prior research in education technology has identified the opportunities and risks of increasing GAI dependence in higher education, but have tended to neglect the perspective of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) faculty from a micro- and macro-level perspective. Using a semi-structured interview approach of faculty in a mid-Atlantic HBCU (N=25), the findings are that many faculty report mixed experiences regarding GAI’s usefulness, as well as their impact on teaching, research, administrative work, productivity, work burden, job satisfaction, equity, and higher education demand. Faculty made demands on AI training and AI policies as adequate institutional responses to the ubiquitous adoption of GAI.

Authors

• L. Larry Liu, Morgan State University

• Walter A.H.L. Fields, Morgan State University