How a pedagogy-first approach can build trust in the AI era
The emergence of generative AI has opened up a trust gap in higher education. In the face of risks to academic integrity and student success, universities must find a balance between embracing AI and safeguarding the learning journey. A THE webinar, held in partnership with Studiosity, explored strategies for enhancing the student experience through modern tools and innovative pedagogical approaches.
Studiosity’s 2026 Global Student Wellbeing Report found that 75 per cent of students who use AI are concerned about being wrongly accused of academic misconduct by AI detection tools. “The police and punish approach creates a culture of suspicion that undermines student trust,” said Lisa Abrahams, partnership development lead at Studiosity. “We need to move from a surveillance-first model within academic integrity to a support-first model,” she said.
The widespread use of AI-driven tools poses a threat to meaningful knowledge acquisition and skills development. The challenge for institutions is teaching students how to use AI while making sure that it doesn’t undermine learning. Garnet Berry, commercial manager at Studiosity, said that maintaining necessary friction within the learning process is crucial. “Students have to put the effort in,” he said. “If you can just prompt something and it gives you the answer that you’re looking for, there’s no learning in that process.”
Studiosity’s “support and validate” approach offers an alternative to the surveillance model to combat the erosion of trust in the value of degrees. It presents a platform that enables students to build critical thinking skills while offering them the opportunity to demonstrate their learning through a self-validation approach. “The key from our side is student agency,” said Berry. “We want to have students in control, but we also want to have accountability built into that.”
While AI is transformative, it will not render the fundamental principles of learning obsolete. Petra Wend, Studiosity academic advisory board member and chair of the university council at the University of Hamburg in Germany, said that in a pedagogy-first approach, student support is an integral feature of their learning journey. “A traditional model probably would say the university provides teaching, and support services deal with students who struggle,” said Wend. “But this is not what it should be about. Support is part of a learning architecture designed around how students actually learn.”
Students are increasingly prioritising the standard of teaching, learning support and educational opportunities available to them. “The support experience becomes the institutional experience,” said Wend. “Quality is increasingly demonstrated through what students are able to achieve and how effectively the institution enables them to do that.”
The panel:
- Lisa Abrahams, partnership development lead, Studiosity
- Garnet Berry, commercial manager, Studiosity
- Alistair Lawrence, head of branded content, Times Higher Education (chair)
Petra Wend, Studiosity academic advisory board member and chair, university council, University of Hamburg
