Minnesota Grad Student Expelled for Allegedly Using AI Is Suing School

Haishan Yang, a Ph.D. student enrolled at the University of Minnesota, was expelled last year for allegedly using artificial intelligence tools to write his essays. He denies the accusations, claiming that his professors are engaged in a “conspiracy” against him, according to local Minneapolis NBC affiliate KARE11, and is suing the school over its decision, as it cost him his student visa.

At issue for Yang is a preliminary exam he completed remotely while traveling in Morocco during the summer of 2024. The exam required Yang to complete three essays over the course of eight hours using his notes, reports, and books—but not AI. While Yang contends that he wrote out his answers, his educators disagree.

A panel of four professors tasked with reviewing his responses said Yang’s essay answers included “involved concepts not covered in class,” acronyms that are allegedly not commonly used in the field but do regularly appear in ChatGPT-generated answers, and extremely similar formatting and content spotted when comparing Yang’s essays to answers provided by ChatGPT when given the same essay questions as prompts. Yang claims the responses were similar because ChatGPT was likely pulling from the same material that he was, but he also believes the professors edited the ChatGPT responses to make them read more like his answers.

Both Yang and the professors hold that there is important context outside of just these essay responses that factor into the ruling.

On Yang’s end, he claims the professors have been out to get him—a notion that his advisor backs, for what it’s worth, telling the review panel, “I never have seen this level of animosity directed at a student.” According to Yang, he had his financial support cut off by the university for what it claimed was poor performance and disparaging behavior during his time as a research assistant and was told by the graduate director that he should simply quit. He appealed that decision and won, getting his funding back and an apology from the school.

As for the professors, they noted that these essays were not the first time Yang was accused of using AI to complete his work. A year earlier, Yang submitted a homework assignment with text in his answer that read “re write it (sic), make it more casual, like a foreign student write but no ai.” Yang said he used AI to check his English but not to generate answers, and he was ultimately given a warning but did not receive further punishment.

Yang lost his case in front of the university’s panel, so now he’s going to try it in court. In January, Yang filed state and federal lawsuits against his professor and the University of Minnesota, accusing them of manipulating evidence and lack of due process. According to KARE11, Yang said he did use ChatGPT to write the lawsuit filings.