Study Smarter: 10 Ways to Use AI for School That Won't Get You Expelled

Students can use AI to create presentations, find research sources, and study complex topics without cheating, but should first check their school's AI policies to avoid discipline, according to PCMag. The article recommends tools like Claude for visualizing topics, transcription services for lecture notes, Quizlet for flash cards and study guides, and Prezi for slideshows, while warning that AI-generated content can be detected and may contain errors.

Using AI /ai/148205/the-best-ai-chatbots to cheat on or otherwise complete your classwork won't help you in the long run, but AI can still make learning easier in plenty of other smart ways. For example, you can save significant time and frustration by leveraging AI to create presentations, find research sources, study complex topics, and more. Regardless of whether you’re in high school or a PhD program, the following tips can improve your academic life and maybe even help you get better grades. Find Out Your School's AI Policies First For schools, AI is very much still the Wild West. Some institutions don't have policies against using AI, while others have severe restrictions. It's up to you to know where your school lands on that debate. If you’re not sure, ask your instructor directly. If you get an ambiguous answer, I suggest erring on the side of caution. The following AI tips are all innocuous in my view, but you still shouldn't use them if you could potentially face discipline. I’m not going to lecture you on the ethics of cheating or plagiarizing—if you want to use AI to do your work for you, that’s up to you. However, just keep two things in mind. One, teachers have many tools for detecting AI-generated content, be it images https://au.pcmag.com/ai/101438/how-to-detect-ai-created-images , text /help/146686/5-ways-to-detect-chatgpt-written-text , or videos /ai/162398/is-that-video-real-7-telltale-signs-its-an-ai-deepfake . Two, AI chatbots make mistakes all the time. While it’s easy to get a chatbot to do your homework, it might not do it well. As a result, you might not get a decent grade on your assignments, which defeats the purpose of using AI in the first place. Preamble aside, below are the best ways to use AI as a student. Also, keep in mind that while I talk about specific services, competing options can likely do most of the same things. Don’t feel like you have to use a certain app if you prefer another. 1. Visualize Complex Topics in Seconds For visual learners, text just isn’t enough. However, you might not have a good visualization of whatever you’re trying to understand at hand. So why not make one? For example, you might remember the battle of Thermopylae from the movie "300," but you can ask an AI chatbot for a historically accurate visualization of it based on a source you choose. Claude excels at these types of visualization tasks. 2. Turn Lectures Into Text You Can Reference Later Taking notes in class can distract you from actually paying attention to the lecture, but you can offload that work to AI. If your instructor allows you to record lectures or posts them online, you can feed that audio to an AI chatbot or AI transcription service /speech-recognition/94075/the-best-transcription-services . Then, you can reference that text directly or use AI to turn it into a study guide. You can even ask an AI chatbot for answers to questions based on the text of said lecture. 3. Make Flash Cards, Study Guides, and More Services like Quizlet /education/74848/quizlet have long allowed you to make digital flash cards, but AI takes them a step further. For example, you can use Quizlet’s AI functionality to quickly generate flash cards based on handwritten notes, slides, or typed documents. You can also use Quizlet to make study guides and practice tests based on that same material with AI, allowing you to spend more time studying and less time preparing to study. 4. Create Gorgeous Slideshows Easily Presentations are almost never a test of your ability to use PowerPoint or a similar app well enough to make something beautiful; rather, they’re about the content within. If you don’t feel like learning the art of the slideshow, you can create the basic layout and structure of a presentation with AI. For example, Prezi /prezi lets you describe in natural language what you want a presentation to look like, and then it makes it for you. Afterward, you can edit it as necessary. 5. Quickly Learn From Mistakes Even the best students get bad grades occasionally, but understanding how to do better isn’t always easy. However, you can feed an AI chatbot any corrections or feedback you receive, any relevant assignment details or grading rubrics, and your assignment, alongside a prompt asking how you can do better next time. This can be especially useful if you don’t have the time to wait for a response from your instructor or if their response isn’t helpful. 6. Don’t Waste Time Scheduling Yourself Going to class, making time for homework and projects, and studying will definitely keep you busy, but you can use AI to better manage your schedule. If you have a school email address, chances are it’s through Gmail or Outlook. And both Gmail and Outlook have dedicated AI assistants, Gemini and Copilot, that work across both calendars and email. For example, courtesy of Google’s Personal Intelligence /ai/162608/gemini-can-now-personalize-responses-using-data-from-your-google-apps feature, you can ask Gemini to look through your email, find all the due dates for your upcoming assignments, and plot them on Google Calendar. You can go a step further by asking Gemini to schedule times for you to work on those assignments before their due dates, too. If Gemini has your class schedule, it can add your classes to your calendar, or you can send Gemini your schedule directly and ask it to update your calendar. 7. Take Notes More Effectively Than Ever Note-taking is an essential part of the learning experience, and many excellent note-taking apps /migrated-33115-productivity/84747/the-best-note-taking-apps are available. However, you should also consider AI note-taking apps /ai/150023/the-best-ai-tools-for-taking-notes , which enhance the experience. For example, Albus can help you brainstorm more efficiently, while Mem automatically shows you related information without so much as asking for a prompt. Copilot in Microsoft OneNote /productivity-2/83593/microsoft-onenote can generate notes for you on almost any topic. OneNote is also free and great for traditional note-taking, too. 8. Use Deep Research to Find Sources If you’ve ever written a research paper, you already know that collecting reliable sources takes just as much time as writing. Luckily, you can use AI chatbot deep research features to kick-start the process. For example, if you’re writing a paper comparing Roman mythology with Greek mythology, you can ask ChatGPT for a deep research report on that topic. Then, you can find its sources in a list at the bottom of the report, which you can investigate yourself. 9. Get a Free Research Assistant If you want to use AI to do more than just find sources or take notes, consider Google’s Gemini Notebook tool. You can upload audio files, PDFs, videos, websites, and more to Gemini Notebook for it to summarize each item and make connections between items. Once you have your sources in place, you can talk to Gemini Notebook as a personalized AI expert of sorts on the topic at hand, which could be useful for bigger research projects. 10. Take the Stress Out of Interview Prep If you’re keen on an internship or ready for your first big job after graduation, preparing for potential interviews is a smart idea. AI can help. Simply prompt a chatbot with relevant job details and ask it to interview you as if it were the hiring manager. Alternatively, many AI video chat services exist, such as Copilot’s Portraits feature, which has a dedicated mode for simulating an actual interview. Don't Be Afraid of AI: It Can Make Your Life Easier Understandably, AI has a bad reputation in the academic world as a way for lazy students to cheat their way to degrees, but in most cases, that’s an unfair characterization. If you use AI intelligently, it can save you time on tedious tasks and make more room for what actually matters. You don't need to use all of these tips, but it's worth trying at least some of them to see if they make you a more productive and efficient learner.