Designing assignments for the GenAI era cannot be done in isolation. To tackle this challenge, Academic Technology Support Services (ATSS), the Center for Educational Innovation (CEI), and Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) recently hosted a full-day, in-person Assignment (re)Design Lab. The event brought together 24 attendees from three UMN campuses, sparking lively, cross-disciplinary strategy sessions among instructors, student guests, and table facilitators. The lab provided instructors with the structured time needed to design new assignments or overhaul existing ones with GenAI in mind. Since teaching goals vary, the workshop supported a full spectrum of approaches, from intentionally integrating GenAI into coursework to limiting its use to safeguard foundational learning. What Made the Lab Value-Driven? Post-event feedback highlighted exactly what made the experience so impactful for faculty: Dedicated Time & Collaboration: Instructors rarely get an uninterrupted day to foc...

In April 2025, Academic Technology Support Services (ATSS), in collaboration with academic technology professionals across the University of Minnesota system, conducted a series of focus groups to understand instructor sentiments and address the complexities of integrating generative AI into higher education. Focus group participants included instructors from multiple University of Minnesota campuses. The goals were to gauge instructors' feelings about the value and applicability of these tools in and beyond the classroom, and to identify where common assumptions about generative AI break down across different disciplines. Note: throughout this post, “generative AI” and “AI” are both used to refer to the broad category of artificial intelligence that can produce content such as text, images, video, audio, and/or code. Focus group process ATSS partnered with Usability Services to establish the session goals, determine participant recruiting criteria, craft the interview protoco...

Are you struggling to keep pace with artificial intelligence (AI) and its rapid pace of change? At Academic Technology Support Services, we were too, so we created this post to make sense of the AI tool categories and how they can support the teaching process. In the post, we compare various AI tools and delve a little deeper into the category of AI Agents or Assistants. Due to the rapid pace of AI functional development, combined with the proliferation of terms, definitions, and tools, this blog post has a significant caveat: This is our attempt to start/continue making sense of what’s new and upcoming in the use of AI; we aren’t looking for a right or wrong way to use an AI platform, or to accurately define groups of AI tools, but instead gain an understanding of how the various factors interact. Whether you agree with our characterizations or not, join the AI iCoP discussions and let us know your thoughts. After our AI review, we will apply AI concepts and tools to an example from ...

  This spring Extra Points features a series of conversations focused on how faculty and staff around the University of Minnesota are using generative AI to do University work.  Lauren Marsh ( Academic Technology Support Services ) interviewed  Emerging Technologies Faculty Fellow   Robert Erdmann , Assistant Professor of Bioinformatics/Data Science at UMN Rochester. The following has been revised for length and clarity. Tell us about your role in the Center for Learning Innovation at Rochester, and how that informs your work with generative AI. Robert Erdmann: UMR is organized into just a single department, the Center for Learning Innovation (CLI). This means that faculty from all disciplines - biology, math, writing, public health - are all in the same unit. This lowers a lot of barriers to cross-disciplinary interactions and collaborations. You get to talk to a lot of people who aren't in your field. It gets us thinking about teaching in different ways. I do...

  This spring Extra Points features a series of conversations focused on how faculty and staff around the University of Minnesota are using generative AI to do University work.  Adam Brisk ( Information Technology Systems and Services ) and Bill Rozaitis ( Center for Educational Innovation ) interviewed Emerging Technologies Faculty Fellow   Mark Collier , Professor of Philosophy at UMN Morris. The following has been revised for length and clarity. Tell us about your role in the Philosophy department and how that is informing your work with generative AI. Mark Collier: I'm a professor of philosophy. I teach a wide variety of courses, including the history of philosophy, artificial intelligence and ethics, philosophy of mind, and biomedical ethics. Because it's a small department, we have broad coverage. My research has primarily focused on the philosophy of David Hume. When I entered grad school at UC San Diego, I joined an interdisciplinary program in cognitive scie...

This spring Extra Points features a series of conversations focused on how faculty and staff around the University of Minnesota are using generative AI to do University work.  Adam Brisk ( Information Technology Systems and Services ) and Lauren Marsh ( Academic Technology Support Services ) interviewed Emerging Technologies Faculty Fellow   Junhua Wang , Associate Professor of Business Communications in the Labovitz School of Business and Economics. The following has been revised for length and clarity. Tell us about your role in the Labovitz School of Business and Economics (LSBE) at UMD, and how that is informing your work with generative AI. Junhua Wang: I teach the course Business Communication, which is an upper-division, writing-intensive course required for all students at LSBE. I think generative AI presents significant opportunities to help students in the writing process, such as enhancing their drafting, revising, and editing skills. Recognizing this potential, I b...

  This spring Extra Points features a series of conversations focused on how faculty and staff around the University of Minnesota are using generative AI to do University work.  Mary Jetter ( Center for Educational Innovation ) and August Schoen ( Academic Technology Support Services ) interviewed Emerging Technologies Faculty Fellow Darren LaScotte from the Minnesota English Language Program in the College of Continuing & Professional Studies. The following has been revised for length and clarity. Give us some context for your work with generative AI: what was the class, and who are your students?  Darren LaScotte: The basis of my project was seeing how generative AI might promote language learning. I teach a writing-intensive English as a second language course, which prepares students for First-Year Writing (University Writing 1301). We work on teaching students the writing process and provide feedback on things like content and organization in its culturally s...

  This spring Extra Points features a series of conversations focused on how faculty and staff around the University of Minnesota are using generative AI to do University work. Adam Brisk ( Information Technology Systems and Services ) and August Schoen ( Academic Technology Support Services ) interviewed Emerging Technologies Faculty Fellow  Fernando Burga , Assistant Professor of Urban & Regional Planning in the Humphrey School of Public Affairs. Tell us about your role in the Humphrey School and how that is informing your work with generative AI. Fernando Burga: I'm an assistant professor in urban and regional planning at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs. I'm also a specialist in community development at Extension. I teach a variety of courses, including land use planning, site planning, and a class called civic participation. My role is essentially divided into three main areas: research, teaching, and service. I emphasize the use of AI and large language model...

  This spring Extra Points features a series of conversations focused on how faculty and staff around the University of Minnesota are using generative AI to do University work.  Lauren Marsh ( Academic Technology Support Services ) and Bill Rozaitis ( Center for Educational Innovation ) interviewed Emerging Technologies Faculty Fellow   Ezgi Tiryaki , Professor of Neurology in the Medical School. The following has been revised for length and clarity. Tell us about your role in the Medical School and how that is informing your work with generative AI. Ezgi Tiryaki: I am with the Medical School and involved with the Office of Faculty Affairs, focusing on faculty development programming. Until last year, I co-directed a program called Foundations of Leadership Excellence (FLE). I am also helping co-lead the Rothenberger Leadership Academy for mid-career health systems leaders. My involvement and use of AI are primarily in the sphere of faculty development. Tell us about y...

"I have felt skeptical of my professors' skepticism towards AI. It's kinda like in elementary school or middle school where they said 'you need to know these numbers because you won't have a calculator in your pocket at all times' and I was like 'dead wrong, I do have a calculator in my pocket on my phone at all times.'" Participant in student focus group, November 2024 In November 2024,  Academic Technology Support Services,  in collaboration with academic technology professionals across the University of Minnesota system, convened student focus groups and asked about their use of generative AI technology. Focus group participants included students from multiple system campuses at the undergraduate and graduate levels. The goal was to learn when and why students use generative AI in their classes. Toward that end, we asked students: What do you consider when deciding whether or not to use AI for an assignment or to support your learning in t...