Mentafy is a digital companion for writing academic papers – providing support during all steps from finding a topic to the final submission.
AI language models (e.g. ChatGPT) have the potential to help with the writing of academic texts. However, AI can also be misused to write entire texts for the student. Academic thinking, research and writing skills are not acquired this way.
What can teachers do? For example, use AI-detection software or new rules and forms of examination. However, there is no truly working AI-detection software in sight. Close supervision of students is ideal but also time-consuming and not realistic in every scenario. A reasonable approach left is having authors document the creation of their work precisely so that their personal contribution can be clearly understood.
Mentafy helps with exactly this as follows:
Step-by-step guidance of a good writing process through a clear project plan and concrete tips & tricks for finding topics, research, citations, etc.
Maximum simplification of the documentation of the writing process (photos, voice notes, files go directly into the research log via app), in order to learn self-organization and to be accountable to examiners.
Automated supervision of the writing process directly in the familiar word processing program, so students always cite correctly and to use AI sensibly and transparently.
So, students receive 24/7 digital mentoring that supports writing, documentation and the use of AI. Educational institutions use Mentafy to improve compliance with academic writing guidelines. Teachers further benefit from pedagogical information about the students‘ progress, a standardized research protocol and warnings about worrying writing patterns so that they can evaluate their personal contribution.
Conclusion: Mentafy supports the acquisition of writing competence and a productive use of AI while maintaining the learning objectives and guidelines.