I think this is partially true. One problem is that when your classmates cheat, your average hard work performance is no longer competitive.

A lot of my classmates used to cheat on French quizzes. I knew the words, usually, but would get like 30% because missing an accent would mark the whole sentence as incorrect. If no one cheated and more of the class earned 30%s the teacher would have realized she needed to either teach differently or give partial credit if you just missed an accent. Instead, it just looked like I was dumb, cause everyone else was getting it.

I think it's like that with AI. if everyone else is finishing quickly, you have to start using it to remain competitive, regardless of whether you originally wanted to learn. These are kids, and they can't understand the opportunity they have yet. They just don't have the life experience to calmly decide to give themselves a huge disadvantage current day for a hypothetical advantage in the unpromised future.