AI Course Policies and Syllabi Statements

This page offers guidance and support in the following areas:

General Considerations for Developing AI-Use Guidelines for Coursework
Questions to Consider When Developing an AI Syllabus Statement
Levels of Acceptable Uses of AI in UNLV Courses
Sample Syllabus Language Options for AI-use
Additional Syllabus Ideas for crafting AI-use course policies with UNLV Faculty examples
Documentation: AI Tool Usage Acknowledgment and Citation Guide

You may download a companion guide of this page to support the development of your own course policies and syllabi development.

1. General Considerations for Developing AI-Use Guidelines for Coursework

Creating a syllabus that thoughtfully incorporates or restricts the use of AI in coursework requires a balanced approach. It’s important to consider the educational value of AI, its ethical implications, and the need for academic integrity.

It is important to be clear with students regarding how and when you expect them to use, or to not use AI tools in your course.
Faculty are responsible for communicating their AI guidelines to students at the beginning of the course and embedding them within the course syllabus. Faculty should regularly update their course syllabi to reflect changes in AI policies and provide clear guidance on the acceptable use of AI in coursework.
The guidance you provide should align with the norms of transparency and accountability of your discipline, as well as with guidelines and policies relating to the use of generative AI in courses in your university unit.

From the UNLV Policies for All Instructors: Artificial Intelligence and Generative AI

2. Questions to Consider When Developing an AI Syllabus Statement

Does your statement cover different types of assignments, i.e., tests, essays, presentations, group work, etc.?
Do you want to ask students to verify or check sources of information used by an AI tool when possible?
How will you explain the benefits of this approach for students’ learning, personal, and professional development?
How will you detect and handle violations of this course policy?
How will you ensure that all students have access to tools and support for learning about steering generative AI and critically analyzing output?
Does your syllabus statement align with the norms of transparency and accountability of your discipline?
Does your syllabus statement align with guidelines and policies relating to the use of generative AI in courses in your university unit?

From the UNLV Policies for All Instructors: Artificial Intelligence and Generative AI

3. Levels of Acceptable Uses of AI in UNLV Courses

Many higher education institutions are adopting “traffic light” systems to clarify the permitted levels of generative AI use in coursework. UNLV outlines four levels along a spectrum from full integration to complete restriction. At the “green light” end, some courses may encourage unrestricted AI use without requiring citation, while others allow AI with proper acknowledgment of its contribution. In the “yellow light” zone, AI use is permitted only with prior instructor approval. At the strictest “red light” level, AI use is prohibited altogether.

The university outlines four levels of acceptable AI use, which form a spectrum from full integration to complete restriction. At one end, some courses may encourage unrestricted use of AI without the need for citation, while others may allow AI with proper acknowledgment of its contribution. Certain other courses permit AI use only with prior instructor approval, and at the strictest level, some prohibit AI use altogether. These levels give faculty the flexibility to decide how AI best fits their course, while ensuring students use it responsibly. This approach gives faculty the flexibility to decide how AI best fits their course, while ensuring students engage with it responsibly. (From UNLV Libraries: AI 101 Starter Guide - “Levels of Acceptable Use” ; Corbin, T., Dawson, P., & Liu, D. (2025))

Learn more about these 4 levels below:

🟩 Encouraging the Use of AI
Use is freely permitted with no acknowledgment

🟦 Use only with acknowledgment
Students are allowed to use advanced automated generative AI tools on learning activities in this course if that use is properly documented and credited.

🟨 Use only with prior permission
Students are allowed to use advanced automated generative AI tools in learning activities in this course if instructor permission is obtained in advance. Unless permitted to use generative AI tools, each student is expected to complete each assignment without substantive assistance from others, including automated tools.

🟥 Discouraging the Use of AI
Use prohibited

4. Sample Syllabus Language Options for AI-use

🟩 Encouraging the Use of AI
Use is freely permitted with no acknowledgment. Students are allowed to use advanced automated tools on learning and assessment activities in this course; no special documentation or citation is required.

🟦 Use only with acknowledgment
Students are allowed to use advanced automated generative AI tools on learning and assessment activities in this course if that use is properly documented and credited.

Students are welcome to use AI tools as supplementary resources to assist with learning activities, as long as they are conducted in an ethical and responsible manner that does not circumvent authentic learning. The student is expected to:

Cite any AI tools properly, following the citation style specified by the faculty member.
Not use AI tools to replace independent thinking, analysis or engagement with course content.
Provide evidence of how the AI tool contributed to the learning activity, including what the student learned from the AI tool, how its accuracy and reliability were verified, and any limitations and biases.
Consult with their professor before submitting work if there are any questions about what constitutes acceptable use of generative AI tools.

🟨 Use only with prior permission
Students may use advanced generative AI tools in this course only with prior permission from the instructor.

Unless explicitly permitted, all assignments must be completed independently, without substantive help from others or from automated tools.

When AI tool use is allowed, students must:

Use AI tools to support learning, and not simply to generate assignments, discussion board posts, essays, presentations, etc.
Not use AI tools to replace independent thinking, analysis or engagement with course content.
Cite any AI tools properly, following the citation style specified by the faculty member.
Provide evidence of how the AI tool contributed to the learning activity, including what the student learned from the AI tool, how its accuracy and reliability were verified, and any limitations and biases.
Consult with your professor before submitting work if there are any questions about what constitutes acceptable use of generative AI tools.

🟥 Discouraging the Use of AI
Use is prohibited
Students are not allowed to use advanced automated generative AI tools on learning and assessment activities in this course. Each student is expected to complete each assignment without assistance from others, including automated tools. The student is expected to:

Do their own work and cite any sources you use properly.
Not use any generative AI tools such as, but not limited to, chatbots, text generators, paraphrasers, summarizers, or solvers, to complete any part of your coursework.
Consult with their professor before submitting work if there are any questions about what constitutes acceptable use of generative AI tools.

5. Additional Syllabus Ideas for crafting AI-use course policies:

Additional Syllabus Ideas for Crafting AI-Use Course Policies

Apply a traffic light system by assignment. Instead of setting one blanket policy for the entire course, assign AI-use levels to each task. For example, a research proposal might be “green light” for full AI use, a literature review “yellow light” for conditional use with instructor approval, and a final exam essay “red light” for no AI use. This allows AI integration to align with the learning objectives of each assignment.
Declarative Policies - This approach requires students to declare or disclose their use of AI in assessments. Some instructors mandate that students acknowledge any AI tools used in their work, specifying the tool’s name, the prompts provided, and how the output was utilized. Others have introduced a mandatory AI use declaration on assessment

Permit AI for research exploration, but not text generation. For example, students may use AI tools to survey existing scholarly materials, identify relevant sources, and summarize key debates in our course topics. However, they may not use AI to generate specific text that appears in their written assignments, ensuring that the final work reflects their own critical thinking and writing skills.
Co-create community guidelines. Begin the course with a conversation about the learning outcomes and how AI might support or hinder them. Then, work with your students to collaboratively develop a set of community guidelines for AI use that reflects shared values, expectations, and academic integrity.
Explain the purpose of your AI policy to your students: Here are some sample statements from UNLV faculty.

Contributing faculty grant permission for all UNLV faculty to reproduce and incorporate these syllabi statements in their own courses without citation or acknowledgment. If you would like to contribute a statement, please send to tl.commons@unlv.edu

Melissa Morris, Professor-in-Residence, Mechanical Engineering writes in her ME311 syllabus:

Developing competencies in the problem solving skills and concepts covered in this course will prepare you for success in your future coursework and ultimately an engineering career. Any student found to be using resources on assignments/assessments such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) or Generative AI will be sanctioned according to UNLV’s Academic Integrity Policies. The instructor will assign the sanction of an F in the course to any student found accessing the aforementioned resources during a quiz or exam.

Kay Callahan, Assistant Professor-in-Residence of Public Health uses a red, yellow, green policy by assignment and includes the following statement of purpose and a clear statement about how to document AI when appropriate.

Purpose and Rationale

As artificial intelligence (AI) continues to advance, the effective use of AI tools has become a crucial skill for future employment.

This course acknowledges the growing importance of GenAI literacy and aims to equip students with some basic knowledge of GenAI and some practice using these tools.

However, mere reliance on GenAI without the opportunity to independently write and think critically will result in an inability to produce and evaluate high-quality work, which will have disastrous long-term effects.

Therefore, this AI policy attempts to balance the integration of AI tools with the development of fundamental communication and analytical skills.

These guidelines are meant to ensure transparency and academic integrity in the use of GenAI.

[The above purpose and rationale statement is used in all sections of PBH205.]

6. Documentation: AI Tool Usage Acknowledgment and Citation Guide

Acknowledging AI Tool Usage

As generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools become more common in academic settings, you may design assignments that allow students to use them. In these cases, it is important to set clear expectations for how students can use them (for example: to brainstorm ideas, refine arguments, or improve writing). It is also important to be clear on how students should acknowledge AI’s role in their work.

When incorporating AI into your assignments, consider asking students to:

Follow all instructions and restrictions you provide on its use
Clearly identify the AI tool(s) used and describe how it contributed to the assignment
Provide a written acknowledgment of the extent of their AI use
When applicable, include a citation or reference in the required style, using the closest comparable source type (e.g., a non-recoverable source).

By establishing these guidelines, you help students use AI transparently and responsibly, while maintaining academic integrity.

Sample AI Took Usage and Acknowledgement Statements

Here are a few examples of an acknowledgement guidelines you might use in a course or assessment.

EXAMPLE 1:

Part B: Concise summary of AI use in the assessment.

Very briefly explain the ways that you have used AI in the production of this assessment.

Explain which AI tools you have used and for what purposes. Describe what output from the tool/service has been included, and where.
If you have found and used tools on your own, explain why these tools were selected and provide a URL link to the tool.
Note the number of iterations undertaken with each main AI collaborative tool.
Summarize how you have altered, adopted, or built on the AI output.

In addition to using this summary to provide an overview of how AI has been used, it is strongly recommended that you also carefully document the processes undertaken in creating the assessment and to be able to present this process evidence upon request from educators or administrators.

from "Acknowledging the Use of Generative Artificial Intelligence," Student Academic Success, Monash University

EXAMPLE 2:

Any use of GenAI tools for assignments must be explicitly disclosed.
Not disclosing GenAI use will be considered Academic Misconduct.
Students must include a statement specifying the GenAI tools used, the extent of their use, and the specific tasks for which AI assistance was sought.
Optional GenAI use assignments: As Instructors, we openly acknowledge that we are unaware of all the possible uses of GenAI that students might use and cannot predict exactly how students might use the technology to enhance their learning. Generally speaking, if you think you might be “cheating”, ask us before using the technology in that way!
Specifics

Standard spelling and grammar checking is expected for all written work, including discussion posts, and does not need to be disclosed.
If GenAI is used to format references and in-text citations, a statement should be included on the References page. Ex. "This reference list was formatted with the assistance of ChatGPT".
Prompt Disclosure: Unless otherwise specified in assignment directions, students are required to provide a list of all prompts entered into GenAI tools. This disclosure should be included as an appendix in the submitted work.

from UNLV PBH205

Suggested Format Statements

Providing suggested format statements is another way to set clear expectations for students' AI use.

EXAMPLE: I used [ADD AI tool (ADD link if needed)] to [ADD how used] and [ADD number of iterations/drafts]. I modified the outputs in [ADD ways].

For more examples, see Acknowledging the Use of Generative Artificial Intelligence," Student Academic Success, Monash University

Citation Guide

See this useful guide created by the UNLV Writing Center on how to cite AI in MLA and APA.

In academic writing, you are required to cite the use of AI so that readers know the source of your information. You must include an in-text citation and an entry on the reference page when citing generative AI in APA and MLA formats, just like you would cite material from other sources.

When citing AI, it is important to cite the AI tool and version used, the date used, the prompt that generated the referenced output, and how the AI was functionally used (ex. used to translate or summarize an online article). A citation is needed regardless of whether AI output is being summarized, paraphrased, or quoted.

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