Ai and 7671

Personally I think there are two separate questions in this.

Should students be allowed to use electronic copies of the regulations. Personally I think yes, if we learn how to search the regulations effectively there is a better chance in the real world of finding rules that apply to a sittuation, ideally this would be an AI based search that could only look at current regulations and other documents. It would be great if the rules, relevant guidance notes and articles from the likes of beama all came up in a single search.

I can see that using electronic documents does also create a security issue with preventing cheating, but it wouldn't be that expensive to provide dedicated devices for viewing the regs that don't have internet access during the exam.

Agreed that using AI to search generally available information is risky if not backed by other checks with the actual regulations. But electricians can be taught how to use it more safely, ask it to quote regulation numbers, restrict the search to current version of BS7671 only, ask for detailed cable calculations to be shown etc. Then look at the actual regs for a final check.

I am halfway through a 2391 course. It is spread over six weeks, one day per week. I set homework every week and advise candidates to use 7671 and GN3 as much as possible in attending to it. Eleven candidates. I asked them yesterday if they are using Ai. Every single one has used it in some way in their efforts. 
It is my view that electrical installation training should embrace Ai at every opportunity. However, I believe that as long as certain parties benefit financially from books and online multiple choice exams that require candidates to rummage through them in search of an answer buried in their pages, I doubt much will change. 

lyledunn said:

Every single one has used it in some way in their efforts.

What is the age range please?

lyledunn said:

Every single one has used it in some way in their efforts.

What is the age range please?

Chris Pearson said:

What is the age range please?

That’s an interesting question. Have you a point?

Yes. I am really really old and indeed an OAP. AI does nothing for me and I shudder to think what my later father (born 1920) would have thought of it.

However, young folk do things differently. Better? Worse? You decide.

I am with GK. In another forum, a contributor wrote that some young folk do not even know how to hold a pen. My little girls do, and they can write to me, but is that out of date? Do young folk just text? (With their thumbs.)

There are lots of skills that are era specific - we have central heating, I have to program the timer, my parents grew up with open fires and were much happier with matches and newspaper, in later years they had central heating, and I had to program their timer as well... A  more modern example to come will be something like the use of a manual gearbox on the driving test, currently a good idea,  unless you don't mind being restricted to a subset of vehicles, but electric cars will render this moot in the next few decades as they don't have gears at all. 

It may be that we go from my great grandparents who could not read and write, coming from  long line of farmers who never really needed to, who were then out of place in the 1920s to great great grandchildren who never need to turn a page or move their eyes to read, as the words scroll automaticlly.  

We tend to think, and stay thinking,  in the terms of the system we grow up in. My kids have stopped correcting me when I say O level instead of GCSE, and now explain school years in terms of ages - they have finally realised I'm not re-learning that. 

Examiners tend to think in terms of the exams they themselves did, as well as the ones set last year..

A sudden change just makes it very hard to compare levels, I don't think its as simple as the cost of books, though that may be a factor.

Mike..

mapj1 said:

A  more modern example to come will be something like the use of a manual gearbox on the driving test, currently a good idea,  unless you don't mind being restricted to a subset of vehicles, but electric cars will render this moot in the next few decades as they don't have gears at all.

My 17 y.o. granddaughter is learning to stir the cogs manually, but frankly, why would anybody want a manual modern car? Auto gearboxes are much better than they once were. However, she may at some stage wish to drive an old car.

In any event, I do not think it will be long before driving becomes unnecessary.

I'd find it unnerving, but a child brought up that way would not worry a jot.

mapj1 said:

now explain school years in terms of ages

Same here, but interestingly, "sixth form" has survived.

mapj1 said:

Examiners tend to think in terms of the exams they themselves did, as well as the ones set last year.

I suspect that whether it's 3 hours with an unlimited supply of paper, or remote open book with a deadline, the same people will still get the distinctions and the strugglers will struggle. Doubtless educationalists will have the evidence.

What does need to be avoided is plagiarism, so be careful how you use AI.

mapj1 said:

my parents grew up with open fires and were much happier with matches and newspaper, in later years they had central heating, and I had to program their timer as well

I am sitting before one right now (fire, not timer). My desk sitting in the 120 year old draughty bay window left me with no choice 'cos I was cold. Problem is that I didn't have a timer, so it was only by mid-afternoon that the room became warm.

However, Mr and Mrs Fred Blake had no such problem. Their timer was one of the five domestiques who got up bright and early, cleared the grate, and got a new fire going. (Or could have banked it up overnight.)

AI does have it's place.  A suitably qualified and competent person could/can use AI to help in their productivity because if AI offers a suggestion that is totally wrong the person will know it is wrong and not blindly follow it.  You can take the early stories of people using SatNav and ending up in rivers or the sea as an analogy.  BUT a person that does NOT have correct subject knowledge/competence/experience could/would be lead astray.

Therefor You're only as good as your tools and If you know your tools, you will maintain them, choose the right ones, and know how to use them effectively