College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

A college instructor has gone analog to fight a very 21st-century problem. It has been reported that the instructor introduced typewriters in class after discovering students were submitting AI-written assignments. The move is simple and dramatic: no internet, no copy-paste, just clacking keys and black ribbons. Old-school, stubborn, and oddly nostalgic. Will it stick? Time will tell.

Why a typewriter, of all things?

The logic is plain. Typewriters force a slower, more deliberate writing process — you draft, you commit, you can’t instantly regenerate five alternatives with a click. It has been reported that the instructor also framed the switch as a life-lesson: accountability, focus, and craft over shortcuts. It’s less about romanticizing a bygone tool and more about changing the workflow so the “easy out” of AI looks less appealing. Think less autopilot, more elbow grease.

Student and academic fallout

Reactions are mixed. Some students reportedly found it freeing, a weirdly tactile way to reclaim their work; others saw it as impractical, an unnecessary hurdle in a digital world. Concerns over accessibility and grading logistics crop up fast — not every learner types well on a manual machine, and instructors must still check ideas, structure, and originality. It has been reported that the story sparked a wider conversation online, with educators weighing whether low-tech fixes can scale or if new honor systems, assessment designs, and AI-detection tools are the real answer.

This little experiment raises a bigger question: when technology shortcuts the learning process, do we push back with policy, pedagogy, or paper? The typewriter stunt is a provocation as much as a solution — equal parts pedagogy and performance art — and it forces institutions to ask what they truly value: polished output or the messy work that produces it.

Sources: sentinelcolorado.com, Hacker News