GenAI for graduate students
As a graduate student, you are expected to exercise heightened responsibility in any use of Generative AI (GenAI), particularly in research and professional work. This includes upholding intellectual and data sovereignty, disciplinary ethics and academic integrity.
Your engagement with GenAI should deepen relevant, contextualized inquiry and support reciprocal knowledge exchange with supervisors, collaborators and communities, rather than delegating your scholarly judgment.
Dos
As a graduate student:
- consult with your supervisor(s) and committee about expectations for GenAI use
- make GenAI use transparent in academic work, following disciplinary norms for disclosure
- think critically if using GenAI as a collaborator to explore and innovate in your discipline
- treat ethical GenAI use as paramount, especially in relation to data sovereignty, Indigenous knowledge, and community-based information
- follow appropriate protocols to prevent input of confidential, sensitive, or community-owned data into GenAI tools
- exercise heightened responsibility for the integrity, accuracy and ethical implications of any work that involves GenAI
- consider recommendations to use university-approved GenAI tools
A note on plagiarism tools
UVic has chosen not to use plagiarism detection tools due to concerns about how they collect and store student information and intellectual property. We prioritize protecting student privacy and educating students on how to maintain academic integrity while using educational tools.
Instructors may not use GenAI tools to grade students' work or to determine whether a student has violated UVic's Academic Integrity Policy.
Principles applied
Respect
If permission is granted, use GenAI in ways that protect your integrity, sustain relationships with supervisors and communities, acknowledge original knowledge keepers through accurate attribution, and ways that your research impacts the environment.
Relationships
Deepen relationships by engaging supervisors, committees, and communities in dialogue about GenAI, co-creating norms that sustain trust in your research and professional practice.
Relevancy
Ensure relevancy if using GenAI by deepening grounded, context-specific inquiry that reflects the communities, methodologies and professional situations to which you are accountable.
Responsibility
Exercise heightened responsibility by rigorously checking GenAI-assisted work, protecting sensitive and community-owned data and foregrounding ethical implications in your research.
Reciprocity
Practice reciprocity by using GenAI to support your research and thesis writing in ways that share well-attributed insights back to your scholarly and community contexts, strengthen collective knowledge, and respect disciplinary and community norms.