Thibault Schrepel of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam tested AI’s impact on student performance over two years. He split students in his 'Law of AI' course into three groups: one without AI, one with unguided AI suggestions, and one with structured training. The no-AI group scored lowest in both years, finishing last in 2024 and 2025.

The no-AI group mostly made minor wording tweaks, rephrasing for clarity and cutting redundancies. Only a few subgroups tried substantive legal improvements. After ten to fifteen minutes, many subgroups regularly ran dry, an effect Schrepel calls 'idea exhaustion.' Going without AI did force deeper discussion among group members, though.

The second group accepted AI suggestions largely without question, often reasoning that they 'sounded better,' Schrepel writes. Some students replaced the terms 'shall' and 'individual' with AI-suggested alternatives without showing they understood the legal implications. Every subgroup kept at least one misleading or legally extraneous term from ChatGPT's output.

Only the trained third group engaged in genuine back-and-forth with the AI, testing different phrasings and digging into the substantive questions behind the assignment. The training advantage nearly vanished by year two.

All three groups performed at roughly the same level in 2025. Schrepel attributes this to growing chatbot familiarity.

The second group's performance surprised him, Schrepel writes. He expected the uncritical errors from the classroom exercise to carry over into the exam. The opposite happened.

The errors didn't repeat, and the group actually scored slightly higher than the AI-free group. That forced Schrepel to abandon his starting assumption.

Skipping AI instruction is a missed opportunity, but it doesn't cause the educational collapse some had predicted. Universities should rethink bans, Schrepel says. Department leaders should resist blanket AI bans and give instructors room to experiment.

Universities also need to invest in AI skills for faculty, many of whom feel poorly equipped.

Source: thedecoder