Where Did Study Groups Go?
On campus blackboards, students once wrestled with Euclid and Lobachevsky together, chalk in hand, laughter and frustration weaving into discovery. Faculty at St. John’s College caution that ChatGPT’s “study mode” risks turning this experience inward, replacing communal struggle with solitary efficiency. The essence of education is not quick answers but the slow, messy process of learning in dialogue with peers. When natural thought is traded for synthetic summaries, the fabric of inquiry begins to fray. Real learning is forged in conversation, in the bonds of shared effort, not in isolation.
St. John’s College, Annapolis. Public domain / Wikimedia Commons.