2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Since its release in November 2022, ChatGPT has significantly influenced writing practices across educational disciplines, particularly in engineering writing courses. This study expands on a prior investigation that surveyed 110 undergraduate engineering students on their attitudes toward ChatGPT's role in writing tasks. To explore evolving perceptions, a follow-up survey with the same cohort was conducted after extended use of the tool. Additionally, 102 faculty members from the College of Engineering Technology were surveyed, focusing on their perspectives regarding students' effective use of ChatGPT, their ability to critically assess AI-generated content, and its implications for academic decision-making. Together, these datasets provide a comprehensive view of ChatGPT's impact on academic writing education from both student and faculty perspectives.

While students initially viewed ChatGPT with optimism, their growing awareness of its powerful capabilities led to heightened concerns about originality, plagiarism, and over-reliance. Faculty, by contrast, remained cautious from the outset, emphasizing the need to preserve critical thinking and foundational writing skills. Both groups called for clearer institutional policies and structured guidelines for the ethical use of AI tools in educational contexts.

The findings underscore the need for a balanced and proactive framework to leverage generative AI’s benefits while safeguarding educational integrity. Key recommendations include: (1) establishing clear institutional policies on permissible AI use; (2) developing AI literacy modules to foster critical engagement; (3) implementing process-oriented assessment models, such as version history reviews and reflective writing logs, to emphasize students' intellectual contributions; (4) promoting active faculty involvement in guiding ethical AI use; and (5) adopting targeted detection and verification strategies to ensure accountability without discouraging legitimate tool use. This study offers a nuanced, evidence-based contribution to the discourse on responsible AI integration in engineering education, advocating for practices that balance technological innovation with core educational values.