A math professor at the University of California, Berkeley, has admitted to using artificial intelligence to help edit an op-ed she wrote. The piece discussed what she called a math skills gap among some of her students.
Zvezdelina Stankova published the 2,000-word article in the San Francisco Standard last week. In it, she claimed some of her math students were five to eight years behind in their education.
She said many students lacked basic knowledge of fractions and algebra that is normally taught in middle school. Stankova blamed the University of California system's test-blind admissions policy for the problem.
How the AI Use Was Discovered
Student journalists at Berkeley's own newspaper, the Daily Californian, noticed the writing style of the op-ed sounded like AI. A Berkeley sophomore named Francis Luo ran the text through an AI detection tool called Pangram.
The software estimated that 33% of the article had been generated or assisted by AI. This finding led to questions about how the piece was written.
Stankova responded by admitting she used AI software to help edit the article. She said the work behind the op-ed involved several hundred person-hours of research, including about 80 hours of her own time.
She explained that she used AI to find documents and articles related to her research topic. Stankova said the actual analysis in the piece came from her and her team members, not from AI.
The San Francisco Standard also addressed the situation. The outlet said its policy expects humans to be behind every article it publishes and to take responsibility for the content.
The Standard said it understood the op-ed to reflect Stankova's own research and expertise, along with that of her colleagues.
Reaction and What Comes Next
News of the AI use sparked debate online. Some critics called it ironic that a piece about students being underprepared used AI assistance during its writing.
Others said the use of AI was not a serious issue and took attention away from the actual argument in the piece. Stankova herself said the AI question was a distraction from the research her team has done.
The debate over standardized testing in UC admissions has grown over the past several years. In 2020, UC regents voted to phase out tests like the SAT and ACT as admission requirements.
Other schools, including Harvard, Stanford, MIT and Yale, made similar changes at the time. All of those schools have since reversed course and brought the testing requirement back.
In her op-ed, Stankova presented data suggesting the number of students with a severe math skill deficit had tripled since test-blind admissions began. She was also one of the authors of a June letter signed by more than 3,000 UC faculty members supporting a return to standardized testing.
Stankova said AI was used to help edit that letter as well. The UC academic senate announced in late July that it would review whether standardized testing should return for admissions.
Any changes resulting from that review would affect UC admissions starting with the fall 2028 class at the earliest. A UC AI council member said current AI detection tools, including Pangram, are still unreliable and lack nuance in some cases.
