This semester, posters generated by artificial intelligence are increasingly visible across community spaces at the 5Cs. Recent controversies around such fliers have led the Associated Students of Pomona College (ASPC) and the Associated Students of Claremont McKenna College (ASCMC) to discourage members from using it for external communication and promotional materials.
In July, the Coop Store posted two AI-generated fliers on Instagram, drawing criticism from students. In response, ASPC passed a motion Sept. 10 temporarily prohibiting Senate and staff from using AI while student senators developed a more specific policy.
ASPC President Malu Estoducto PO ’27 said the discussions revealed differing views among senators about acceptable uses of the technology.
“I just noticed that people hold very different perspectives on what’s an acceptable use of it or not,” she said.
On Oct. 1, Estoducto presented an ‘AI Use Bylaw Amendment’ during a senate meeting to be added to ASPC’s code of ethics. The initial proposed bylaw would prohibit senators from sending AI-generated images or videos for communications to external parties like the student body, as well as strongly discourage them in general from using AI in their public-facing roles.
Following feedback from students seeking tighter restrictions, senators revised the proposal in an Oct. 8 meeting to ban the use of AI by senators in all external communications, presentations or marketing; however, the revised version did not receive the 12 out of 15 votes required to pass, and is set to be voted on again in later weeks.
For ASPC Vice President of Academic Affairs Tendo Lumala PO ’28, enforcement remains a central concern especially because, if the proposed bylaw passes, senators’ use of AI could result in reduced stipends, as per ASPC’s bylaws.
“It’s very easy to see an AI-generated poster for the Coop Store and realize that would be a violation of the policy — someone using AI in one of their emails is a little bit harder to enforce,” Lumala said. “Making sure that if we’re going to be knocking people’s stipends, we have a meaningful enforcement mechanism and [are] reckoning with the reasons why some members of ASPC would want to use it … has been a concern of mine.”
Lumala also questioned whether investigating suspected AI use would be a productive use of executive board members’ time. He favored the earlier proposal’s approach, which discouraged AI use, over a blanket ban, which he said would establish expectations without creating strict enforcement concerns.
Estoducto said senators intend to revisit the proposal when enough members are present for a substantive vote. If the broader ban again fails to pass, she said Senate could reconsider the earlier, narrower language.
“I still believe that senators who are strongly against AI would prefer to have a weaker policy than have no policy at all,” Estoducto said.
ASCMC has also been grappling with its AI poster policy. In an email to the student body on Oct. 5, an ASCMC member forwarded an AI-generated poster created by a student for a White Lies party. The poster sparked pushback from students on anonymous campus-based social media app Fizz about the use of AI and how the post seemed to portray all but one student as white.
“Can we boycott the white lies party tomorrow?” one anonymous post read. “AI poster that had clear racial undertones[,] I will not stand for this.”
Another anonymous user attached a screenshot of the AI-generated poster directly to their post.
“This looks like some sh*t I’d get hate crimed at,” they wrote in their post, which received 1,900 upvotes.
At executive board meetings on Oct. 11 and Oct. 25, ASCMC discussed the use of AI to generate posters for student-sponsored events. Senators agreed to avoid AI use as an executive board, but did not adopt an official ASCMC policy.
ASCMC President Amrit Dhaliwal CM ’27 told TSL she feels assured by the “collective understanding” that the executive board reached.
“I really feel confident that the people on [the executive] board have an understanding of the downsides of using it,” Dhaliwal said. “They understand that students aren’t always going to be happy if they use it, and they understand that they have a responsibility when they put things out to students that they’re responsible for what’s in it.”
Maxwell Johnson CM ’29, ASCMC director of club finances, expressed support for the informal agreement.
“Being leaders on campus, we ought to be in tune with what people want and what people appreciate and also dislike,” Johnson said. “So I think AI plays a large role in that in terms of how we present ourselves through digital communications.”
Dhaliwal added, however, that the board may revisit the AI use question in the spring.
“Any change made in the constitution now won’t go into effect until March when the next board takes over, so I’m thinking we don’t even have the option to put anything in writing now that would be formal,” Dhaliwal said. “When it comes to maybe March [or] February, we can reevaluate where we are.”
Jarrett Catlin, a CMC visiting assistant government professor teaching Public Policy in the Age of AI, said there are ways to ethically apply AI in creating graphic design materials, such as promotional flyers.
“There are cases in which it’s art for artistic expression, but there also is art for utilitarian purposes, right?” Catlin said. “If you’re an e-commerce store that just needs to create product images to sell some gizmo on Amazon, then the process doesn’t really matter so long as it’s an accurate representation.”
ASPC’s vote on the AI ban bylaw has been postponed until there are enough people present at a meeting to pass it, according to Estoducto.