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Presentation
AI Policies in Japanese Universities: Background, Characteristics, and Classroom Implications
The November 2022 release of ChatGPT 3.0 prompted higher education institutions (HEIs) around the world to publish guidelines for faculty, students, and staff, and there is a growing research effort to characterize and analyze these documents. Early studies analyzing generative AI policy documents at the world’s highest-ranked HEIs reveal divergent approaches despite sharing common concerns, such as academic integrity, data security, integration of AI in learning and assessment, and communication with students (An et al., 2025; Moorhouse et al., 2023; Xiao et al., 2023).
The present study contributes to this growing effort to profile AI policies by focusing on HEIs in Japan. Using the dataset collected by Gallagher (2024), it applies grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) to analyze nearly 400 AI policies from Japanese universities to document emerging patterns. The presentation begins with a brief overview of global AI governance efforts. It then focuses on issues that particularly affect teachers and students, such as concerns about GenAI’s impact on critical thinking, creativity, autonomy, fairness, strategies in learning and assessment, and the management of academic integrity. The presentation will help language educators in navigating institutional policy on GenAI and in understanding emerging GenAI best practices to enhance teaching.
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Tosh Tachino, Ph.D., is a lecturer at Aoyama Gakuin University. His research interest centers around the role of language at the intersection of academic research and public policy, and one of his current research projects is examining AI policies in Japanese universities. His previous work has appeared in the Journal of Applied Linguistics and Professional Practice, Text and Talk, Written Communication, Explorations in Teacher Development, and in an anthology Genre and the Performance of Publics (Utah State University Press), among others.
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Cameron Smith is a lecturer at Aichi Gakuin University. His research interests include the role of creativity in education policy, creative writing in foreign language learning, content and language integrated learning (CLIL), and more recently, the advent of AI and DX (digital transformation) in higher education.