Artificial Intelligence grading your ‘neuroticism’? Welcome to colleges' new frontier

Hechinger Report ^ | 4/26/21 | Derek Newton

[anthropocene_x]

Now, simple AI-driven tools like chatbots, plagiarism-detecting software and apps to check spelling and grammar are being joined by new, more powerful – and controversial – applications that answer academic questions, grade assignments, recommend classes and even teach.

The newest can evaluate and score applicants’ personality traits and perceived motivation, and colleges increasingly are using these tools to make admissions and financial aid decisions

Hundreds of colleges subscribe to private platforms that do intensive data analysis about past classes and use it to score applicants for admission on factors such as the likelihood they will enroll, the amount of financial aid they’ll need, the probability they’ll graduate and how likely they are to be engaged alumni.

Australia’s Deakin University has an AI assistant named Genie that knows whether a student asking a question has engaged with specific online course materials and can check students’ locations and activities to determine if they’ve visited the library or tell them when they’ve spent too long in the dining hall and prompt them to move along.

The University of St. Thomas in Minnesota said it tested an AI system that can scan and analyze students’ facial expressions to determine whether they’re engaged or understand the material. The system would immediately tell professors or others which students were becoming bored or which points in a lecture required repeating or punching up.

New York University, Southeast Missouri State University and other schools have used a service called Element451, which rates prospects’ potential for success based on how they interact with a school’s website and respond to its messages.

The result is 20 times more predictive than relying on demographics alone, the company says.

[anthropocene_x]

This is terrifying CCP-level survellance. Wait until your employer starts using stuff like this.

[algore]

Eliza, Eliza, what has become of you..

[tbw2]

Oppression by algorithm.

And employers ARE starting to use it. One version is the still early “bias detector” in HR. You as a manager rate employees or candidates for a job. The software compares the ratings you give versus what other managers do plus compares your demographics to theirs. White rating a black? Black gets a boost to what they think is “average”. White statistically rating blacks or women lower? You get downgraded and a strike against you.

[Gay State Conservative]

I’m a Reagan/Trump Republican...therefore I’m obviously off the chart.

[Dr. Sivana]

Eliza, Eliza, what has become of you..

How does what has become of me make you feel?

[ViLaLuz]

This type of surveillance will increase with the increase of 5G.

[grey_whiskers]

Australia’s Deakin University has an AI assistant named Genie that knows whether a student asking a question has engaged with specific online course materials and can check students’ locations and activities to determine if they’ve visited the library or tell them when they’ve spent too long in the dining hall and prompt them to move along.

Can it tell if they left their phone in the dorm room?

Can it tell if they're just hooking up in the stacks at the far end of the 3rd floor of the library, or studying?

[jmcenanly]

There might also be a 'Health monitor", which records movement and heart rate. Of course this isn't perfect. I wore one during a movie, and it recorded that I had fallen asleep. The movie was Rogue One and the trailer was for Dunkirk.

[grey_whiskers]

...and that's the problem. Once it is recorded in the system, it is inviolate.