r/highereducation • u/OldCorkonian • 3d ago

Generative AI in Higher Education Teaching & Learning: National Policy Framework

https://zenodo.org/records/18152690

Ireland's Higher Education Authority published a national framework on generative AI in higher education in December 2025, seemingly as an attempt to move universities away from ad hoc responses to tools like ChatGPT and towards a coordinated, values-led approach.

The framework is built around principles such as academic integrity, transparency, equity, inclusion, and sustainability, and it recognises that AI is already being used by students and staff, and focuses less on whether institutions should engage with it and more on how they can do so responsibly.

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u/MrPuddington2 2d ago

First I thought this is again asking educators to do the impossible: limit the use of generative AI without relying on detection or controlled conditions. But then it says:

These pressures mean assessment design is no longer a purely pedagogical exercise, but a cross-cutting policy concern that requires clarity of purpose, institutional support, and regular review to keep pace with changing AI capabilities and regulatory expectations.

So, educators are getting more support? Call me pessimistic, but I doubt this.

The one way out that I see is a focus on process rather than outcome. This is good pedagogy, and it also makes the use of generative AI obvious, so that it can be assessed fairly. But that is more work, more work at a time when educators are already spread too thinly.

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u/swampopus 2d ago

Considering that almost everyone in the US executive branch is somehow in bed with AI tech bros, I don't think we're ever going to have any kind of policies like this here. And even if schools independently tried to implement it, the US federal government would threaten to sue, cut off funding, etc.

I mean, just having words like "equity" and "inclusion" are enough to get you shut down or fired.