A professor who helped write UC Berkeley's strict new AI policy says it's about preserving 'the value add of a lawyer'

• UC Berkeley Law School is implementing a stricter AI policy.
• The general policy is that students can no longer use AI for activities such as brainstorming.
• UC Berkeley Law School professor Chris Hoofnagle said it’s about making sure students learn fundamental skills.

Hoofnagle concedes the policy has loopholes. After all, policing AI is becoming a Sisyphean task in a world where search engines are adding AI overlays to ensure their continued relevance. He said that even standard searches on Lexis and Westlaw now have an LLM-generated summary.

“There is no kind of clean answer for it,” he said, adding, the school “obviously can’t ban search.”

Schools are trying to keep up

Law schools and undergraduate universities are alike in trying to stay ahead of the wave of AI advancements and the challenges that accompany them.

Princeton recently announced the most significant change to its honor code in 133 years, The Daily Princetonian reported. As of July 1, all in-person examinations will be proctored. The advent of AI was cited as one of the reasons for the change.

Hoofnagle said that Berkeley law has seen an “uptick” in misconduct cases and has converted more take-home exams to in-person as a result. The in-person exams are conducted on a computer with specialized software that prevents access to the internet and the use of copy-and-paste functions. Despite the precautions, he said it is still possible to cheat.

“You can’t protect against everything in the world, but there’s a really strong signal that if you cut corners, ultimately the student will pay for it when they have to take an in-person exam,” he said.