In the earlier job-application lesson you drafted a CV and a cover letter for a real role. Today you are reflecting on a tool that can rewrite that letter in seconds: AI.

We open on one sharp claim: Using AI to write your job application is cheating. Both sides have a real case. You will hear two or three voices, then stop arguing in the abstract and meet an AI letter with a pen in your hand. You decide where the line is from what you find in the letter, not from a lecture.

Three terms you will use while you annotate and while you write. Read them once, then keep them beside you for the main step.

Part 1: annotate the AI letter (about 14 minutes). The letter below was generated by AI for a Sales Assistant role at a fictional Irish shop, Harbour View Stores. It is fluent, well structured, and hollow. Using the annotator, tag lines as:

• Untrue: factually false for a typical Leaving Certificate student
• Generic: anyone in the room could have sent it
• Employer-spot: a hiring manager would notice this immediately

The same tags apply to a real Irish retailer or to the employer you chose for Cover Letter v1: named shop floor, weekend rush, product line, or customer type is what a human who had been there would write. When the class is ready, reveal the model annotation and notice where you disagreed.

Part 2: write your own and draw the line (about 20 minutes). Create (or open) a document titled AI in Applications in your Strand 2.2 Digital Portfolio folder (for example AI in Applications or a plain-text file with the same name). This is a working document for later Strand 2.2 evidence and Portfolio in Action selection, not a finished ALT on its own. Structure it as:

1. Your three tags from the annotator (or a short note on each)
2. Your cover letter (roughly 120–180 words) for the same role you chose in the earlier job-application lesson
3. Three short boundary lines (see below)

Open your Cover Letter v1 from that earlier lesson. If you do not have one, use the spare school-leaver role your teacher will give you and write for that. Every claim needs a checkable detail from your own life. Minimum viable letter: at least one named place, hour, person, or result that only you could supply. If time is tight, rewrite three hollow sentences from Cover Letter v1 into authentic ones instead of a full new letter, then still complete the three boundary lines.

Under your letter, write three short lines:

1. What you would let AI do in an application
2. What you would not let AI do
3. One sentence argued from something you found in the AI letter today

This document is the evidence that your position on AI is based on meeting the thing, not on a slogan.

Talk these through with the person beside you, or sit with them quietly. Your position should sound different from the one you held at the start of the lesson if the AI letter taught you something.

• Where is the line for you now between AI as a tidy-up tool and AI as the author? Name one concrete use that sits on each side.
• If an employer is screening applications with AI at the other end, does that change what counts as fair on your side? Why or why not?

If you want a portfolio note later, add two sentences under your three lines in AI in Applications: what you believed at the start of today's lesson, and what you believe now.

Today you reflected on AI in job applications by working on a real sample and writing from evidence, not from a slogan.

• You staked an early position on whether using AI to write an application is cheating, without settling it from the air.
• You annotated an AI-generated cover letter for lines that were untrue, generic, or obvious to an employer.
• You started or advanced your own cover letter for your Cover Letter v1 role with checkable detail only you could supply (or rewrote three hollow sentences into authentic ones).
• You drew your own line in three sentences: what AI may do, what it may not, and why, argued from evidence in the letter.
• Your AI in Applications document in Strand 2.2 now holds the annotated findings, your letter (drafted or in progress), and that three-line judgement. It is working evidence for later Strand 2.2 and Portfolio in Action selection. If your letter is still mid-draft, finish it at the start of next lesson.