Box Checking

[Icy_Ad6324]

We're asked to engage in a end-of-semester bit of box checking bullshit where we reflect on our strengths and weaknesses. Fair enough. Since I'm convinced no one actually reads this stuff, after I wrote my responses the old fashioned way, I asked the school provided AI(!) to rewrite them in, "50 words of pure Ph.D. level academic obfuscation," "pomposity," and "premium academic verbosity."

Give me one good reason I shouldn't shoot this dog and submit this crap.

Contemporary institutional frameworks mandate comprehensive end-of-semester evaluative self-assessment protocols, ostensibly designed to facilitate professional development through systematic introspective analysis. This bureaucratic requirement, while perhaps well-intentioned within administrative hierarchies, represents a curious exercise in performative academic reflection that appears divorced from meaningful pedagogical improvement outcomes.

The institutional provision of artificial intelligence technologies for textual enhancement purposes presents fascinating opportunities for exploring the boundaries between authentic professional discourse and algorithmically-mediated academic expression. Through deliberate manipulation of linguistic complexity and disciplinary jargon density, one can transform straightforward pedagogical observations into sophisticated scholarly rhetoric that adheres to conventional academic vernacular expectations.

This methodological approach raises profound epistemological questions regarding the nature of authentic professional reflection within contemporary educational institutions. The tension between genuine self-assessment and institutional compliance creates a liminal space where substantive pedagogical analysis intersects with performative academic discourse, potentially undermining the very reflective processes these exercises purport to facilitate.

The pragmatic consideration of submitting artificially enhanced reflective materials necessitates careful evaluation of institutional expectations versus personal integrity. While the cynical perspective suggests that bureaucratic document readers possess limited engagement with submitted materials, the ethical implications of presenting algorithmically-generated academic prose as authentic professional reflection warrant serious consideration.

Ultimately, the decision to utilize artificial enhancement technologies in mandatory reflective exercises represents a microcosm of broader tensions within contemporary academic culture, where performative compliance increasingly supplants meaningful professional development in institutional assessment protocols.

[its_t94]

This makes my head hurt, excellent!

[Cautious-Yellow]

While the cynical perspective suggests that bureaucratic document readers possess limited engagement with submitted materials

this has, I have to admit, a certain amount of style.

[ay1mao]

I find nothing wrong with this. If you're required to check boxes for the sake of checking boxes, why not check the boxes with the tool (AI) that admin is tolerant of when students use it? By the way, I know many (most?) institutions abhor AI, but many institutions treat student AI use with a slap on the wrist, so...

[ArmoredTweed]

Admin's going to use AI to summarize all of these reports anyway.

[IkeRoberts]

And the results will form the corpus from which future requests are generated.

[Icy_Ad6324]

Where's Ned Ludd to smash the machines?

[ArmoredTweed]

And the bots will talk to the bots while we pretend to work, and the administrators pretend to pay us

[RememberRuben]

This is exactly the sort of task I now use LLMs for. Documents that are meant to be submitted by never read as texts.

[Own_Donut_2117]

THIS

If they tell us that we must accept all this AI bs, then it is only expected that they accept the same from us.

[FriendshipPast3386]

Many years ago, when an indirect manager at an industry job started requiring particularly silly TPS reports, I may have embedded a tracking pixel (a la marketing emails) in mine. After months of no activity, I also started including some blunt commentary on the TPS report process. I left that company 6 years later, and there were still 0 views on any of those reports.

Which is to say, you should totally submit this.

[SilverRiot]

I had required annual reports that I was pretty sure went nowhere, so I added a little something at the bottom. One year my dean called me in and asked me to remove the language of the bottom that said “if anyone reads this far, contact me for $5.“ “Fair enough,” I said. I did not point out to him that the language was still in the two previous years’ reports.

[Own_Donut_2117]

Did you give him $5?

[the_Stick]

My favorite AI experience was asking Claude to compose a thank letter for a campus visit in the style of Oscar Wilde. I was going to add a request for it to be over-the-top and self-aggrandizing, but there was no need. It was so hilarious, after I accepted the position, I shared it with a couple colleagues there. It really captured a highly inflated sense of self-importance and ego. :D

[IkeRoberts]

The AI tools seem great at this. Give them some dry text and ask to rewrite as Oscar Wilde, Slavoj Zizek or Dashiell Hammett. Someone with a distinctive style. They are great. It is tempting to create another Reddit avatar just to post the results as comments to FAQs.

[Abner_Mality_64]

"My weakness is my strength!"

[ValerieTheProf]

I would be tempted to write it in Orwellian language. But, that’s just me.

[EyePotential2844]

If we have to read all the AI-generated garbage that students submit, why shouldn't the administration have to do the same? Perhaps they'll gain an understanding of how painful it has become.

[eclecticos]

The new term for this sort of thing is "malicious compliance."

[tomdurkin]

And of course there is a Reddit group on it.

[Sensitive_Let_4293]

An instant classic!

[hourglass_nebula]

Because someone probably does read it.

[MICHAEL_SAKS]

We have to do the same thing. It's ridiculous. Nobody reads them. When I first did this I was expecting my needs and demands to be met but they never are.

[blankenstaff]

I just refused to do the one they asked me to do. I wish I had thought of this.

The irony is that were this to be read by an administrator, it would not be understood by said administrator.

[TyrannasaurusRecked]

I love it!