"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...

Academic Technology Support Services (ATSS) partnered with Instructure , the parent company of Canvas, to conduct a usability study on some of Instructure’s most recent updates to the Canvas Discussion tool. The study aimed to understand user experiences to implement changes and/or improve training.  Usability partnership & study process Since 2015, the University of Minnesota academic technology teams have conducted usability studies to understand how instructors and students use different learning technologies. This work is carried out with internal and external stakeholders such as University of Minnesota academic technology leadership, the academic technology community , and our learning technology vendors. For this study, the Canvas Discussions tool was selected for two reasons: Instructure was redesigning the tool, and it’s used in approximately 25% of University of Minnesota academic courses as shown in the graph below. Discussions are heavily used in those courses: as o...

In November 2023, Academic Technology Support Services (ATSS) conducted focus group sessions with University of Minnesota (UMN) undergraduate and graduate students. The goals of the sessions were to: understand students’ level of awareness about Generative AI,  understand how students perceive the acceptable use of Generative AI for their academic courses, and learn how, if at all, students would like to be involved with shaping how Generative AI is used in education and shaping policies. Process In partnership with the Office of Information Technology (OIT) Usability Services team, ATSS team members: established the project goals determined recruiting criteria for participants and  defined discussion points to drive the conversations.  During the focus group sessions, the project team served as observers and documented their observations. After all sessions had been completed the team reviewed the issues and analyzed them to determine how they might inform strategies, p...

Around the world, generative AI is changing how we work, how we teach, how we learn, and how we think. The rapid proliferation of AI technologies and their initial hype suggests that the future of teaching, learning and writing will require some integration and collaboration between humans and AI content generators. In these early days of AI, instructors and researchers are already encountering and exploring ways AI technologies emerge in the context of teaching and learning. On September 29, 2023, Academic Technology Support Services, the Center for Educational Innovation, and the Writing Across the Curriculum program hosted instructors from several disciplines to share their experiences using (or responding to) ChatGPT in their classrooms in Spring 2023.   Jay Coggins - Applied Economics Jay Coggins, Professor of Applied Economics, inaugurated the panel by observing that our students will likely use AI tools throughout their careers, and explained that responsible use would be a ...

Co-authored with Mariam Tahir and Jeff Weber This is the first in a series of posts that describe how the Academic Technology Services team is partnering with the Carlson School of Management in order to learn more about student perspectives on learning data and accelerate the adoption of learning analytics. We invite you to follow our journey and find out what happens next! In early 2023, the Academic Technology Services team sponsored a capstone project with the Carlson School of Management for the undergraduate Information and Decision Sciences Department. The capstone project, called “Learning Analytics: The Student Perspective,” offered a unique opportunity to have students engage their peers on the topic of learning analytics and then submit recommendations based on their findings. This post describes the goals of the capstone project and the recommendations offered by the participating student teams. We will also describe some next steps that we are actively exploring. What is ...

Do you host office hours to answer questions and deepen student learning?  Are struggling students, who would really benefit from office hours, not attending?  Would you like to increase attendance and enhance participation?  Change the name Retitle 'Office Hours' to 'Student Hours' to increase attendance. Students have disclosed that they thought 'Office Hours' refers to when instructors are physically on campus and that the time is dedicated to their own research and class preparation. Students mistakenly assume stopping by is an interruption! Changing the name, or at least emphasizing to students that this time is set aside for them , may increase attendance.  Vary the Format Through Canvas you can set appointment blocks where students schedule one-on-ones or you can set open times for students to drop in. Read, Canvas: Use the Calendar to Schedule Office Hours for specifics. Consider dedicating time slots that are open to drop-ins and allow multiple studen...