The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana, Prof Nana Amfo, has urged universities to rethink their assessment methods as artificial intelligence makes it increasingly easy for students to generate essays and answers without necessarily demonstrating genuine understanding.
Amfo said universities needed to place greater emphasis on assessing students’ reasoning, practical skills and ability to apply knowledge, rather than relying heavily on conventional examinations and written assignments.
“If a student can generate an apparently competent essay in seconds, what exactly are we assessing when we ask for that essay?” she asked.
The Ghanaian academic spoke while delivering the keynote address at the formal opening of the University of Lagos International Week 2026, held at the J.F. Ade Ajayi Auditorium on Tuesday.
The event, which ran from October 12 to 17, had the theme, “Re-imagining Pedagogy and Teaching for Higher Education in the 21st Century.”
Personalities at the event included Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, represented by the Lagos State Commissioner for Tertiary Education, Tolani Sule; the Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, represented by a director in the Ministry of Education, Elizabeth Ogundipe; and the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission, Prof Abdullahi Ribadu, represented by Dr Ayoteju Ogun.
Also present were the Resident Representative of the United Nations Development Programme in Nigeria, Elsie Attafuah, and the Vice-Chancellor of UNILAG, Prof Folasade Ogunsola.
Delivering the keynote address, Amfo said the growing use of AI in education presented universities with an opportunity to reconsider how they taught students and measured learning outcomes.
She recommended greater use of oral examinations, project-based assessments, portfolios, presentations and practical demonstrations to establish whether students understood the concepts they were expected to learn.
“We must distinguish between a student who can produce an answer and one who understands how to arrive at, evaluate and defend that answer,” she said.
She, however, cautioned against treating AI solely as a threat to academic integrity or celebrating it uncritically as a solution to educational challenges.
“The real challenge is to ask how AI can strengthen learning without weakening the intellectual capabilities that education is supposed to develop,” she said.
Amfo also urged universities to incorporate digital literacy and applied AI into their curricula across disciplines, saying graduates needed to understand the technologies reshaping contemporary life.
She said technological competence must be accompanied by an understanding of the social inequalities, ethical considerations and responsibilities associated with developing and using such technologies.
According to her, universities should produce graduates who could think critically about technology rather than merely use it, adding that African institutions should contribute to shaping AI systems instead of remaining passive consumers of technological innovation.
Amfo, a linguist, raised concerns about the limited representation of African languages in the databases and technologies underpinning AI systems.
She said some AI tools struggled with local names, accents, expressions and culturally specific meanings, warning that the growing reliance on such systems could reinforce existing linguistic and knowledge inequalities.
“If these systems become increasingly central to education, we must ask whether they will expand access to knowledge or reinforce existing linguistic and epistemic inequalities,” she said.
Credit: Punchng
