Soumitra Dutta wants universities to rethinking learning

Every semester‚ the same conversation echoes around faculty offices and curriculum committees around the world: are AI detection tools really enough? Assignment formats evolve․ The plagiarism policy is rewritten‚ but every semester‚ the technology moves faster than the policy designed to contain it․

Soumitra Dutta‚ former dean of Oxford's Saïd Business School and co-creator of the Global Innovation Index‚ believes the academic community is working on the wrong problem․ Preventing students from using AI is energy that could be spent on something far more consequential: rethinking what education is actually trying to accomplish․ He concludes that attempting to outsmart AI tools is "an exhausting arms race" that educators are not going to win‚ partly because the technology is so capable and ubiquitous‚ and partly because it is changing so quickly that institutions are unlikely to keep up․

"Stop grading the paper‚" says Soumitra Dutta, Oxford Dean (Former)․ "Start grading the process․" What isn't easily automated is hard to fake‚ and worth measuring: defending a position in real time‚ under questioning‚ with nothing to hide behind․ Being able to show your reasoning as it develops‚ not just its polished final form․ Drafts‚ structured dialogue‚ oral examination‚ live problem-solving‚ all reveal what a student actually knows better than a finished document ever could‚ precisely because they cannot be outsourced․

What this moment really clarifies is the irreplaceable function of the teacher․ AI can explain‚ summarize‚ write‚ code and so forth․ It cannot notice that the trouble a student has is not understanding‚ but confidence․ It cannot ask the question that reframes how someone sees an entire field․ It cannot give us the kind of direct feedback that turns the course of someone's life․ For Soumitra Dutta‚Oxford Dean (Former) we are not‚ "in a race against technology but in a race to redefine the unique value of human connection in education".