CHAI - Contextual Honor Codes for AI literacy and Academic Integrity

The rapid growth of (Gen)AI is reshaping how students learn and how teachers design and assess learning. While policies such as the EU AI Act and institutional guidelines at THUAS offer valuable direction, they remain intentionally broad to ensure they are flexible enough for different programmes and teaching practices. As a result, many concrete questions about (Gen)AI use are left to individual courses and programmes to interpret. 
At the same time, students and educators often enter these discussions with very different levels of experience, confidence, and expectations regarding GenAI. Most existing initiatives address them separately, which means opportunities for shared understanding and collaborative decision‑making are limited.

CHAI – Contextual Honor Codes for AI literacy and Academic Integrity

The CHAI project is grounded in the principle of informed choice, which brings together its two core pillars: AI regulation and shared AI literacy.

The focus on AI regulation addresses the need to translate broad institutional and legal guidelines into practical, context‑relevant agreements, i.e. honor codes. Through structured dialogue, students and teachers collaboratively determine when, how, and why GenAI should-or should not be used in their own programmes. These agreements are then formalized in honor codes, wherein future educational activities are organized across increasing levels of AI involvement (from No AI to Full AI); framing the group’s shared understanding of what constitutes fair AI use in that context. 

Equally important is the development of shared AI literacy. Because students and educators often come to GenAI with very different levels of familiarity, expectations, and needs, CHAI brings them together to build a common understanding of what GenAI tools can and cannot do. This is why in addition to the customizable honor code template, students and teachers also receive a supplementary information package about the capabilities, limitations, risks and potential of GenAI. 

Project Timeline and Development

The project is funded by AI HUB and began in the last quadrant of the year 2025. The current phase of the project involves pilot sessions with two programmes at the THUAS; one at the Public Administration (conducted in February, 26) and another in Applied Computer Science (to be conducted in May, 26). Basis the insights from the pilot, the methodology would be refined for the broader use within THUAS.

The project is multidisciplinary, and will be carried out with the support of various stakeholders and areas of expertise:

1. AI and AI literacy (Research group Learning Technology & Analytics; Prof. Theo Bakker, Dr. Manika Garg and Sunčica Bruck, MSc.).
2. Ethics and law (Research group Multilevel Regulation; Prof. Barbara Warwas and Dr. Kanan Dhru)
3. Co-creation (Research group Sustainable Talent Development; Prof. Ellen Sjoer and Dr. Miranda de Hei).

Contact

We are interested in hearing any feedback, questions or ideas for collaboration that you may have. Please contact senior researcher Manika Garg at [email protected]