Recent investigations in automated essay scoring research imply that hybrid models, which combine feature engineering and the powerful tools of deep neural networks (DNNs), reach state-of-the-art performance. However, most of these findings are from holistic scoring tasks. In the present study, we use a total of four prompts from two different…

This paper introduces REFLECTSUMM, a novel summarization dataset specifically designed for summarizing students' reflective writing. The goal of REFLECTSUMM is to facilitate developing and evaluating novel summarization techniques tailored to real-world scenarios with little training data, with potential implications in the opinion summarization…

As generative AI (GenAI) continues to permeate academia, distinguishing between student-authored essays and those by Large Language Models (LLMs) becomes crucial for maintaining academic integrity. This study conducted a survey on the ethical awareness of using generative AI tools among a group of STEM students (n=156). Also, we empirically…

In response to (1) studies finding that essay feedback generated by ChatGPT might be useful for student writers and (2) studies observing ChatGPT's tendency to adhere to narrow genre definitions when producing writing, our study seeks to examine whether ChatGPT can provide useful feedback in a first-year writing learning environment that targets a…

Evaluating the quality of university exam papers is crucial for universities seeking institutional and program accreditation. Currently, exam papers are assessed manually, a process that can be tedious, lengthy, and in some cases, inconsistent. This is often due to the focus on assessing only the formal specifications of exam papers. This study…

Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing the education landscape and has been widely applied to language teaching and learning. This study investigates the transformative potential of AI-driven Natural Language Processing (NLP) tools in enhancing writing proficiency, focusing on language precision, content summarization, and creative writing…

This essay examines the potential impact of paid-for or premium language models, where some students may be able to afford advanced models generating superior outputs while others could face inequities due to financial constraints. It explores how this dynamic can exacerbate the digital divide, challenge traditional as well as more recent…

Constructing arguments is essential in science subjects like chemistry. For example, students in organic chemistry should learn to argue about the plausibility of competing chemical reactions by including various sources of evidence and justifying the derived information with reasoning. While doing so, students face significant challenges in…

There is a current debate about the extent to which ChatGPT, a natural language AI chatbot, can disrupt processes in higher education settings. The chatbot is capable of not only answering queries in a human-like way within seconds but can also provide long tracts of texts which can be in the form of essays, emails, and coding. In this study, in…

Automatic essay scoring (AES) is an essential educational application in natural language processing. This automated process will alleviate the burden by increasing the reliability and consistency of the assessment. With the advances in text embedding libraries and neural network models, AES systems achieved good results in terms of accuracy.…

The growing need for automated and personalized feedback in programming education has led to recent interest in leveraging generative AI for feedback generation. However, current approaches tend to rely on prompt engineering techniques in which predefined prompts guide the AI to generate feedback. This can result in rigid and constrained responses…

This study explores the use of large language models (LLMs) to generate feedback on essay-type assignments in Higher Education. Drawing on a seminal feedback framework, it examines the pedagogical and psychological effectiveness of LLM-generated feedback across three cohorts of MBA, MSc, and undergraduate students. Methods included linguistic…

Automated writing evaluation (AWE) systems are developed based on interdisciplinary research and technological advances such as natural language processing, computer sciences, and latent semantic analysis. Despite a steady increase in research publications in this area, the results of AWE investigations are often mixed, and their validity may be…

Student plagiarism has challenged educators for decades, with heightened paranoia following the advent of the Internet in the 1980's and ready access to easily copied text. But plagiarism will look like child's play next to new developments in AI-based natural-language processing (NLP) systems that increasingly appear to "write" as…

The study highlights ChatGPT-4's potential in educational settings for the evaluation of university students' open-ended written examination responses. ChatGPT-4 evaluated 54 written responses, ranging from 24 to 256 words in English. It assessed each response using five criteria and assigned a grade on a six-point scale from fail to excellent,…