The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Lagos, Prof. Folasade Ogunsola, has warned that excessive reliance on artificial intelligence by students could undermine critical thinking and allow them to complete academic tasks without fully learning the skills those tasks are meant to develop.
Ogunsola said AI had significant potential to transform education but cautioned that its unregulated use could enable students to bypass the learning process.
The UNILAG Vice-Chancellor spoke at the 8th Lagos State University Research and Innovation Fair, themed “Accelerating National Development through Artificial Intelligence-Driven Research and Innovation,” held at LASU, Ojo, Lagos.
She said universities had a responsibility to develop students who could think clearly, logically and critically, stressing that the process of struggling with problems was important to intellectual development.
“Our job is to teach minds to think, and a mind that is not challenged cannot think, because the struggle of working things out is what makes a mind think that builds critical analysis, not giving it out to AI,” Ogunsola said.
She warned that tools such as ChatGPT and Gemini could contribute to an erosion of learning and critical-thinking skills when students became overly dependent on them.
“ChatGPT, Gemini and others may be leading to erosion of critical thinking and learning skills. Overdependence on AI is not good for brain development, so there have to be guardrails with AI use,” she said.
According to Ogunsola, the issue facing universities was no longer whether AI should be allowed in education, but how students could use it as a learning assistant without allowing it to replace independent thinking.
“There is nothing wrong with using AI for schoolwork if it is assisting. But if it has taken over, then there are challenges,” she said.
The vice-chancellor advised students to use AI to support their learning rather than allowing the technology to do the thinking for them.
“Students should not seed their brain to AI but use it as an assistant. Using AI does not make you more skilful,” she added.
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Ogunsola noted that AI could retrieve information, recall facts and perform certain processes faster than humans, making it increasingly difficult for universities to completely monitor its use.
She said banning AI would not provide a sustainable solution because students could easily access the technology through mobile devices.
Instead, she urged universities to rethink teaching and assessment methods to determine whether students genuinely understood what they were being taught.
“Right now, what I see in many places is: so what can we do? How do we do it? Because the students are far ahead of the faculty; they have engaged more. Ninety-four per cent of AI-generated research may go undetected,” she said.
Ogunsola argued that universities would need to redefine the skills students are expected to develop as AI becomes increasingly capable of performing tasks that have traditionally been used to demonstrate intellectual ability.
“If we’re going to really start to ensure that the next generation is thinking, we cannot ban AI, but we must find ways to ensure that they use AI to learn, and we have methods to know what they have learned and to force them to think,” she said.
She also identified several other challenges associated with AI in education, including academic integrity violations, inaccurate information or AI hallucinations, data privacy concerns, intellectual property issues, digital inequality and potential job losses.
Despite the risks, Ogunsola said Nigeria could not afford to reject AI, noting that the technology was already widely used by students and could help address challenges such as shortages of teachers and other skilled professionals.
She therefore called for clear institutional guidelines and new assessment methods that would encourage independent thinking while allowing students to benefit from AI-assisted learning.
Another speaker at the event and former Vice-Chancellor of Covenant University, Prof. Adebayo Abiodun, also called on educational institutions to develop clear AI policies for students and staff.
Abiodun acknowledged that AI could support decision-making, improve productivity and provide data-driven insights but stressed that the technology should complement rather than replace human capabilities.
He called for stronger collaboration between universities and industry, saying academic institutions needed to work closely with corporate organisations to prepare professionals for an increasingly AI-driven economy.
Outgoing LASU Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, said the research and innovation fair provided an opportunity for innovators to showcase solutions to contemporary challenges.
She said LASU’s approach should go beyond simply adopting AI as a tool and focus on how research could use the technology to address Nigerian problems.
The fair, attended by academics and other stakeholders, featured presentations and discussions on the application of AI across different fields.