Generative AI Academic Use Policy

Section: II. INST-195
Approved By: Dr. Ivan Harrell
Initial Adoption Date: 05/13/25
Prior Revision Dates: NONE
Last Revision Date: NONE

PURPOSE

This policy does not directly promote or discourage Generative AI use. 
 
This policy seeks to empower Tacoma Community College (TCC) students and faculty by upholding academic integrity values while encouraging transparency in generative AI use and encouraging responsible use of this emerging technology. Responsible use includes awareness of the ethical, social, and environmental impacts of generative AI.  
 
This policy is not intended to be comprehensive or overly prescriptive. This policy serves as a resource for the TCC community who have questions about the responsible use of generative AI that is not clearly expressed through other campus and class policies, through course learning objectives, and/or assigned course work. 
 
This policy also serves as the default policy where there is none in place in course syllabi and/or in assigned course work. 

TO WHOM DOES THIS POLICY APPLY

This policy applies to all members of the TCC community which includes students, staff, and faculty.

DEFINITIONS 

  • Large Language Models (LLM) are generative text-based programs that are pre-trained on large amounts of existing data. Examples of LLMs are ChatGPT, Llama, and Co-Pilot.
  • Generative AI: Generative artificial intelligence (genAI) describes software applications that use LLMs, or other types of models, to create new content such as audio, code, images, text, simulations, and video. Current examples of generative AI are Stable Diffusion (images), Claude (text), and Sora (video).
  • Prompt: A specific input created by a user to guide the genAI model to generate a desired output.
  • Output: The content generated by a genAI tool.
  • Citation: Formally or informally referring to a source of information that is applied to the development of an idea in creative work (for example: a research paper, presentation, work of art, computer program, poem, image, musical score/lyrics, etc.).
  • Generative AI detection tool: Any program that is used to determine whether student submissions of work are partially or fully generated by AI. Examples include GPTZero, Grammarly, Turnitin, Quillbot, etc.
  • Rigor: High-quality academic work that builds skills and competencies. Examples of this include: critical thinking, analysis, synthesis, creativity, accountability, responsibility, and collaboration.
  • Academic Integrity: Refers to the expectation that all course and programrelated work must be completed upholding the values of “honesty, trust, fairness, respect, and responsibility, and courage” (International Center of Academic Integrity).
  • Student Conduct: Student conduct includes upholding the values of academic integrity and all other TCC expectations of safe and responsible conduct.

REFERENCES

Policy

General

Use of generative AI (genAI), like any informational resource or tool, shall be aligned with TCC’s mission and values, and existing academic integrity and student conduct policies.

Students

  • Where present, students must refer to and follow policies and instructions in their syllabi and graded work for course-specific expectations about the use of genAI tools. Students are encouraged to seek clarification of these policies and instructions as needed.
  • Students should cite their use of genAI, or include a description of their use of genAI, where the use of the tool contributes content that is a part of graded work.
  • When students are expected to search for, use, and apply the ideas of others to their own work, students should seek human-authored information rather than use generative AI outputs as sources for that work.
  • When students are experiencing difficulty completing coursework that meets rigor and academic integrity expectations, they should seek help from their instructors, TCC Tutors, TCC Librarians, or TCC Counselors. Students should seek help from these resources instead of using genAI to replace or stand in for their own knowledge work, learning, and skills building.
  • Students assume responsibility for all information that is applied to their own work.

Faculty

  • Faculty should include clear, instructive, well-defined genAI use policies in their course syllabi and in assigned work as applicable.
  • Faculty are encouraged to learn about and explore the uses of genAI especially related to course work, and create academic integrity instruction and generative AI use policies that foster environments of collaboration and trust with their students.
  • Faculty should be intentional, critical, and evaluative when assigning the use of genAI tools to account for equity of access to these tools, and to account for the profound energy and water consumption demands created by the development of and consumer use of genAI tools.
  • Faculty should be cautious in their use of plagiarism and generative AI detection tools, which are unreliable and often provide false positives. In addition, these tools can introduce bias and inequity into the educational assessment process by favoring students who are more skilled with genAI or those who can afford the added benefit of subscription genAI tools.

Notes

As we move forward it is important to keep in mind where the learning is taking place and consider how we can enrich the learning process with and without the use of genAI tools.

This policy depends on goodwill and a sense of fairness. In all of its forms, generative AI is a useful tool that can enhance the learning process for both students and educators and will likely influence the education landscape for years to come.