AI Is Making Student Writing Polished but Hollow, Says Singapore Lecturer
Source: CNA Commentary
Singapore university lecturer Kennedy Albar warns that AI is making student writing polished but hollow, as students rely on generative tools to produce structured arguments they cannot defend. The piece lands as Singapore pushes AI literacy across all schools by 2027.
Singapore university lecturer Kennedy Albar has observed a troubling shift in his students' writing: submissions that are increasingly polished, structured, and interchangeable — all hallmarks of generative AI assistance. In a CNA commentary published Tuesday, Albar warns that while students are producing cleaner prose, they are losing the intellectual struggle that genuine learning requires.
Albar, who teaches ethics and communication modules, noticed the change over recent semesters. Students who once wrote with distinctive voices — some direct, others conversational, some taking risks with unusual examples — now submit arguments that arrive "neatly packaged: a balanced introduction, three structured points, a counterargument followed by a conclusion that sounds thoughtful without saying very much." The same stock phrases appear across entirely different topics. When pressed to explain their reasoning, students who used AI could only repeat the tool's output rather than defend their own thinking.
The problem is not widespread, Albar notes, but even a handful of cases is cause for concern — especially given that Singapore's institutes of higher learning will begin teaching AI skills tailored to each field of study from 2027. The risk is that students begin to conflate access to well-phrased answers with genuine knowledge. Writing, Albar argues, is not merely the final product of learning — it is how students learn to think, organise complexity, weigh competing ideas, and develop judgment. Bypassing that process with AI, even unintentionally, undermines education's core purpose.
Why it matters for Singapore: This commentary lands at a pivotal moment for Singapore's education sector, which is simultaneously embracing AI upskilling and grappling with AI's unintended consequences in the classroom. Earlier this year, the Ministry of Education announced mandatory AI literacy across all schools by 2027, and universities like NUS and NTU have launched dedicated AI centres. But Albar's piece highlights a delicate balancing act: teaching students to use AI effectively without letting it erode the foundational skills — critical thinking, original reasoning, intellectual ownership — that education is meant to build.