Assessment Objectives 

This Financial Markets (RSM230) cours assignment aims to develop students’ analytical skills in finance by examining the relationship between news events and equity prices. It integrates the use of generative AI tools to support the writing process, fostering critical thinking and improving students’ ability to work effectively with AI technologies. Through this assignment, students gain practical experience in financial data analysis, ethical AI usage, and academic writing, while also reflecting on the impact of AI on their learning and skill development in preparation for future careers in finance.  

Assessment Process 

1. Schedule a meeting with a writing coach from the Rotman Commerce Centre for Professional Skills (RC-CPS).
2. Research the stock price of DJT (Trump Media & Technology Group Corp) for the specified timeframe.
3. Develop initial ideas about the relationship between the news events and stock price movements.
4. Use an LLM to assist in writing the first draft of the essay (400-600 words).
5. Meet with the RC-CPS writing coach to receive feedback on the AI-assisted draft.
6. Revise the draft based on the writing coach’s feedback.
7. Submit the final essay, addressing the market’s reaction to Trump’s social media post and interview, interpreting the financial data, and discussing potential future impacts.
8. Later in the course, complete a second essay using a different approach: write the first draft independently without AI assistance, then use an LLM to critique, edit, and improve the self-written draft.
9. Reflect on the two different approaches to using AI in the writing process and their impact on learning and skill development.

Future-Focused Skill Development

This assignment directly aligns with the University of Calgary’s STRIVE model for designing assessments that effectively incorporate generative AI. It aligns with the STRIVE model’s approach to transparency and responsibility. It openly incorporates AI use into the learning process and specifies when and how students are to engage AI tools to support their writing. Students are guided to use AI for drafting and critiquing, encouraging them to be accountable for content creation and recognize the potential overreliance on AI. Furthermore, this assignment promotes integrity by requiring students to work with writing coaches and revise their AI-assisted drafts, modeling appropriate use of AI and critiquing AI-generated output for accuracy. The comparison between AI-assisted and self-written drafts also develops students’ meta-cognitive skills through self-reflection, aligning with the validity aspect of the STRIVE model.

Student Feedback 

What follows are anonymized excerpts from the reflections submitted after the second individual writing assignment was submitted. 

Throughout this course, I can definitely say that using AI has been an interesting part of the essay writing process. Personally, I found that writing the second essay made me think about what I wanted to say, and I had to do background research to back up my statements and use AI in a way more similar to websites such as “Grammarly.” In contrast, using AI for the first essay was unique in the aspect that, although I did research to create a detailed prompt, I didn’t really have to worry about structuring the essay and was able to get a decent framework that I was able to add onto. However, I think AI does have its flaws. It has a lot of implicit biases, returns vague responses, and allows the writer to ‘write’ without really thinking about what they are trying to say. With the ever-growing demand and reliance on AI, I believe that AI will become an integral part of essay writing. Whether it is to streamline research, create outlines, check grammar, or even write the text for you, AI simply allows for a more efficient process. Ultimately, I still believe that it is important for students and professionals alike to continue to try their best to think creatively before relying on AI. If people began to use AI for everything with no second thought, there would be no differing viewpoints. AI should not replace humans but should be a tool that promotes our productivity. 

**  

In the first essay, I generated a draft with AI and then revised it based on feedback from my writing assistant. I appreciated the detailed feedback, but I sometimes felt like the comments were focused on ideas or content that didn’t feel entirely my own. This left me feeling that the final essay, while polished, lacked a bit of my personal voice and connection to the topic. Additionally, sometimes AI lacks the ability to do analyses in depth but rather makes shallow observations, which is again undesirable.  

For the second essay, the process was reversed, writing the initial draft myself and then using AI to refine it. This approach felt more authentic, as I could better express my personal perspective from the start. Using AI for feedback and editing allowed me to improve clarity and organization without compromising my individuality. The AI’s ability to highlight areas for improvement, suggest more concise phrasing, or point out gaps in logic was incredibly helpful. However, I still needed to adapt its suggestions to fit my style, ensuring the essay truly reflected my thoughts.  

I can now see AI as a useful collaborator rather than a creator. In the future, I plan to use it for brainstorming, refining structure, and polishing my writing, while keeping the core ideas and tone uniquely my own. This balance allows me to stay true to my voice while benefiting from AI’s strengths. 

** 

I want to say that I really enjoyed the use of AI and LLMs in this class and I think it is a very interesting concept that was very well done. I liked how this class embraced AI and let us learn how to use it instead of having the zero AI policy like other classes. It was also very interesting to see how they compare when they write it and you correct it and vice versa. My experience with getting it to write a draft was mostly positive except for the fact that there was a lot of fact checking needed. A decent amount of the information was incorrect and even though it sounded good, it wasn’t right. However, I think that making your own rough draft and getting AI to correct it is great. It has all of your original ideas and credibility, but corrects it, makes it flow better, uses more in depth sentences and gives great title options. I will definitely continue to use this method in the future since the outcome was very good. For prompts, I quickly realised that the more specific the better. You aren’t being mean to AI so give it whatever instructions needed. AI is a great resource and will undoubtedly be a huge part of writing in the future especially with how it keeps evolving. Lastly, we have to remember that we can’t strictly rely on AI and still need to learn how to do things ourselves. 

** 

In my experience, AI is a helpful, but imperfect tool when writing essays. For the first essay, I used AI to make an essay based on a series of prompts. While AI was able to develop an essay with strong points, I found structural issues. I found AI repeats the same words, when it may not be needed; it also overcomplicates sentences. Ultimately, I had to go over the essay to comb out errors. This shows AI is not the best tool for writing an essay, as you still have to do work to perfect it. For the second essay, I used AI as a corrective tool, feeding it my essay and an outline of what I wanted feedback on. In return, it fed me lots of feedback, with varying levels of clarity. I got feedback on my essay structure, and how to remake my essay into the word count. However, when it came to the actual content of my essay, it was confusing. It told me to add a personal connection to the essay but to take some of the examples I put in. I did end up taking its advice on my word count structure, and I did my best to follow its feedback on my content. In the future, I plan to use AI to aid me in creating an outline or starting point for me to follow. I found that it succeeded best in creating ideas and points, but not in doing proper writing. 

**  

After completing Individual Essays 1 and 2, I developed a greater understanding about the importance of ethical use of AI and LLMs for academic purposes. Prior to taking this course, I was afraid of even going near AI or LLMs because I feared any kind of use would mean committing an academic offense. However, I learned that as long as used ethically, they are useful for enhancing writing. When we were assigned the first individual essay, I liked using Microsoft Copilot to draft the essay first because of its convenience and timeliness. There were no concerns about how long the writing process would be, since all it took was a prompt for Copilot to generate the essay within a few seconds. Although this aspect was helpful, after reviewing the essay I realized the writing lacked a proper essay structure and wasn’t as detailed as I expected. If it were me who wrote the draft first, I would have conveyed my ideas in a more structured manner. The hassle of using AI to write the whole essay was editing its product afterwards, as everything was disorganized and very different from my style of writing. I also noticed the essay lacked detailed content. 

This experience has shaped my opinion on AI’s role in supporting essay writing. I discovered it is more beneficial to brainstorm your own ideas when generating a draft essay, and then consult AI/LLMs for reviewing the work and providing you with feedback on how to improve. It worked better that way for me in the second essay, and I believe it is better when AI can help out with editing through ways such as giving suggestions on how to make the text more concise. I anticipate using AI for support with essay writing in the future with this method in mind. I feel that when you choose to write your essay first, you are able to give your writing a unique voice and its own personality. 

In my experience with LLM this semester, I found that they are extremely useful on one hand to help revise and generate ideas, but addictive on the other hand. In the essays this semester, I found it convenient to draft the first essay with AI, then it wasn’t hard or stressful to read through and edit the AI draft, since it was already fluent. However, when it came to the second essay, I would say it was harder to come up with my draft than before, due to the easiness of the first draft that LLM came up with. However, using the LLM’s ideas to help me edit my second essay was also helpful and timely, because the computer operates fast and points out the critiques.Using AI to write essays was helpful, however it wasn’t very easy to get what you precisely want. Commonly, AI generates stuff that is off topic and not what you want, so you have to be very specific in the prompt that you give to AI and instruct it do what you want it to do. In the future, I plan to incorporate AI into my writings, however, I will generate primary ideas, and only tell Ai to do the “thoughtless” work, such as editing grammar. This way, I won’t be too reliant on AI but also get the benefit of having AI assistance.