AI Course Policies and Assignment Guidelines
As instructors craft their AI policies, recognizing the prevalence of AI use is crucial. AI output reads as authoritative as well as detailed and comprehensive, and only a person who is informed on the subject for which AI output is generated can well assess its accuracy or usefulness. Students new to a discipline are likely to over-estimate AI’s accuracy and usefulness, and will need careful guidance and education to develop AI critical thinking.
Institutional Context: Academic Integrity Policy
The University’s Academic Integrity policy includes as an example of dishonest behavior “unauthorized assistance or unauthorized materials from any source (including but not limited to oral, audio, physical, digital, text messages, generative artificial intelligence (AI), photographs, apps, websites, and services) to generate a work product.” The emphasis on unauthorized recognizes instructors’ authority to establish clear expectations about whether and how these tools may be used in their courses.
Further, the University’s policy presses students to acknowledge use of AI: “Cite a generative AI tool whenever work created by the tool is paraphrased, quoted, or incorporated into one’s own work product. If generative AI was used to edit one’s own prose, the use of the tool for this function should be acknowledged in the work.”
AI Policy in Montclair Syllabus
While Montclair’s Academic Integrity policy sets expectations, the particulars of what constitutes acceptable use of AI must be communicated clearly to students in their individual courses.
As of Fall 2026, the Montclair Syllabus template will come with a designated field for the course’s AI policy. Faculty will be able to choose from pre-set AI policy templates, including no use of AI, some use of AI, or unrestricted use of AI. Faculty may also write their own AI policy.
Faculty Resources
- OFE’s Citing Generative AI webpage
- Montclair faculty syllabus statements (Google Doc; NetID required)
- Syllabi Policies for Generative AI Repository curated by Lance Eaton
- The Best AI Syllabus Policies I’ve Seen So Far from Daniel Stanford
- “Academic Integrity” section of “AI & Ethics” slide deck by Torrey Trust, Ph.D (UMass Amherst)
- “Writing a GenAI Statement.” Toolkit for the Ethical Use of GenAI in Learning and Teaching (University College Cork)
- Perkins, M., Furze, L., Roe, J., MacVaugh, J. (2024). The Artificial Intelligence Assessment Scale (AIAS): A Framework for Ethical Integration of Generative AI in Educational Assessment. Journal of University Teaching and Learning Practice, 21(06). https://doi.org/10.53761/q3azde36
- Rowland, D. R. (2023). Two frameworks to guide discussions around levels of acceptable use of generative AI in student academic research and writing. Journal of Academic Language and Learning, 17(1), T31-T69. Retrieved from https://journal.aall.org.au/index.php/jall/article/view/915
Last Modified: Thursday, June 25, 2026 1:45 pm
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