UCLA Professor Defends AI-Generated Textbook Amid Academic Backlash

In the winter term of 2024, Professor Zrinka Stahulja introduced an AI-generated digital textbook for a comparative literature course covering medieval and Renaissance writing. The volume was created with Kudu, a UCLA-originated platform that produces digital textbooks from author-supplied notes without pulling external sources. The cover displayed garbled Latin (“Of Nerniacular Latin To An Evoolitun On Nance Langusages”) and generic visuals, prompting immediate mockery from faculty.

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UCLA announced the project at the end of 2024 as a pilot to explore “AI-assisted” instructional materials. Kudu, founded by another UCLA professor, enables instructors to feed personal lecture notes into an AI model that assembles a textbook, embeds a chatbot for student queries, and formats the result for digital distribution.

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• Professor Zrinka Stahulja – course instructor and primary advocate.

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• Elizabeth Landers – graduate student who helped compile the volume and framed its errors as an artistic choice.

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• Kudu Platform – the AI tool used to generate the textbook.

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• Traditional comparable textbooks cost roughly $250 and become outdated within two to three years.

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• The AI-generated textbook was priced at $25.

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• The experiment was announced for the 2024 academic year.

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Professor Stahulja described the AI textbook as a “no-brainer,” emphasizing the time saved in material preparation and the ability to remain “approachable and accessible.” She argued that a custom, low-cost AI text offers greater relevance than expensive, quickly obsolete printed books. The professor also highlighted control over content, positioning the AI textbook as preferable to unrestricted use of commercial tools such as ChatGPT, which she said could pull unrelated internet information.

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Students accessed a built-in chatbot for clarification but were instructed not to use it for assignments. Some reported listening to the textbook while walking or exercising, and the professor claimed that class engagement increased relative to sections that did not use the AI resource.

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Several faculty members raised concerns about AI “hallucinations,” noting that generative models can fabricate facts regardless of source constraints. Critics warned that reliance on such tools may erode critical-thinking skills and threaten institutional learning standards. An English professor warned that the experiment could “create our own replacements,” while another called for the professor’s doctorate to be revoked, labeling the approach an “abandonment of professional responsibility.”

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The professor asserts that the textbook was “carefully edited” and that engagement rose, yet critics point to the error-laden cover and the lack of independent data confirming improved outcomes. The claim that AI-generated errors are intentional contrasts with faculty perceptions of poor quality, leaving the efficacy of the experiment unverified.

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• “they’re an intentional artistic choice that prompts students to question their assumptions about language, meaning and historical truth.” — Elizabeth Landers, Graduate Student

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• “I was really shocked that they couldn’t see that this textbook was my creation; it was carefully edited, just as if it had been printed,” — Zrinka Stahulja, Professor

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• “I don’t see how a traditional textbook that costs $250 and is out of date within two years or three years, would be in some way better than a custom $25 AI-facilitated textbook that is based on my material,” — Zrinka Stahulja, Professor

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• “It’s better than some commercial version that has nothing to do with what you’re teaching or is pulling the information from the internet,” — Zrinka Stahulja, Professor

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• “If you do this you should have your doctorate revoked and be thrown into the stocks at the center of the main university quad,” — Unnamed Professor, Critic

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The UCLA pilot has sparked a broader debate over AI’s role in higher-education curricula. While the professor plans to continue refining the AI textbook, faculty opposition suggests that institutional policies and further empirical studies will shape future adoption.

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