GenAI Studio: News, Tools, and Teaching & Learning FAQs
These sixty minute, weekly sessions – facilitated by Technologists and Pedagogy Experts from the CTLT – are designed for faculty and staff at UBC who are using, or thinking about using, Generative AI tools as part of their teaching, researching, or daily work. Each week we discuss the news of the week, highlight a specific tool for use within teaching and learning, and then hold a question and answer session for attendees.
They run on Zoom every Wednesday from 1pm – 2pm and you can register for upcoming events on the CTLT Events Website.
News of the Week
Each week we discuss several new items that happened in the Generative AI space over the past 7 days. There’s usually a flood of new AI-adjacent news every week – as this industry is moving so fast – so we highlight news articles which are relevant to the UBC community.
In this week’s tech news, U.S secretaries of state urge Elon Musk to address voting-related misinformation spread by the Grok chatbot on X. Google updates Gemini AI, correcting issues where historical images of people were generated incorrectly. Procreate decides not to incorporate generative AI into its products. Anthropic releases their system prompts for Claude (3.5 Sonnet, 3 Opus and 3 Haiku). An AI-powered math app called GauthMath helps students solve math problems with step-by-step explanations.
Here’s this week’s news:
Election Misinformation on X
Five U.S. secretaries of state have urged Elon Musk to address an AI chatbot on X (formerly Twitter) that has spread election misinformation. The bot, Grok, provided incorrect information about state ballot deadlines. The officials emphasize the need for accurate information in the upcoming 2024 elections. Read more.
Google Fixes Gemini’s People-Generating Feature
Google has updated its Gemini AI to fix a controversial issue where it generated historically inaccurate images. An updated version is now available to select paid users, limited to English for its language, with added safeguards to prevent similar issues in the future. Google has not yet revealed when this feature will be made available for free users and other languages. Read more.
Procreate Rejects Generative AI
Procreate, a popular digital art app, has vowed not to integrate generative AI into its products, distancing itself from the technology amidst growing concerns over AI’s impact on creative industries. They are taking the stance that generative AI is a threat to human creativity, even if that means they “seem at risk of being left behind”. Read more.
Anthropic Updates System Prompts
Anthropic has released updates to its AI system prompts for the Claude models, 3.5 Sonnet, 3 Opus, and 3 Haiku. System prompts are instructions for the model that are provided by default at the very beginning of every conversation with a model, to encourage certain behaviours and provide up-to-date information. Read the system prompts.
GauthMath: A Math Solver with AI
GauthMath is an AI-powered app that helps students solve math problems by providing detailed step-by-step explanations, making it a popular tool among students and educators alike. Though still far from perfect, these tools are raising the question of whether AI tools are the next critical step forward from graphing calculators, or are a shortcut to draining out critical thinking skills from students Read the full article and check out GauthMath.
Tool of the Week
Tool of the Week: Danswer
What is Danswer?
Danswer is an AI-powered question-answering tool designed to help teams extract specific information from internal documents quickly and efficiently.
How is it used?
Users input their query, and Danswer searches across connected documents, such as PDFs and databases, to provide precise answers, saving time on information retrieval.
What is it used for?
Danswer is ideal for companies needing to navigate vast amounts of internal data, making it easier to find relevant information without manually sifting through documents. For additional information, explore Danswer.
Without a PIA, instructors cannot require students use the tool or service without providing alternatives that do not require use of student private information
Questions and Answers
Each studio ends with a question and answer session whereby attendees can ask questions of the pedagogy experts and technologists who facilitate the sessions. We have published a full FAQ section on this site. If you have other questions about GenAI usage, please get in touch.
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Assessment Design using Generative AI
Generative AI is reshaping assessment design, requiring faculty to adapt assignments to maintain academic integrity. The GENAI Assessment Scale guides AI use in coursework, from study aids to full collaboration, helping educators create assessments that balance AI integration with skill development, fostering critical thinking and fairness in learning.
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How can I use GenAI in my course?
In education, the integration of GenAI offers a multitude of applications within your courses. Presented is a detailed table categorizing various use cases, outlining the specific roles they play, their pedagogical benefits, and potential risks associated with their implementation. A Complete Breakdown of each use case and the original image can be found here. At […]