AI and Me: Navigating Generative AI for Higher Education Faculty

This course is a self-paced online course based on the University of Tennessee’s AI & ME workshop series, designed to help higher education faculty integrate generative AI into teaching, research, and administrative work through practical strategies and ethical frameworks.

AI and Me Workshop Series includes five sessions:

1. Cultivating AI Literacy in Online Courses. This session introduces foundational concepts of generative AI and focuses on building AI literacy for both instructors and students. Participants explore how AI works, its limitations, and strategies for integrating AI meaningfully into online learning environments.
2. AI for Faculty Productivity: Local AI for FERPA and Productivity & Faculty Tools for Teaching and Productivity. This session highlights practical ways faculty can use AI tools to streamline teaching and administrative tasks, including generating course materials, drafting communications, creating rubrics, and improving overall efficiency.
3. Building Your Own AI Research Assistant Using Open-Sourced Cyberinfrastructure. This session introduces how faculty can leverage open-source tools and local LLMs to build personalized AI research assistants that support academic workflows. The session explores how to integrate large language models, data sources, and research tools to automate tasks such as literature review, data analysis, and knowledge synthesis, while considering privacy and responsible use in research contexts.
4. AI Ethics: Can We? Should We? Navigating Ethical Dilemmas of AI in Higher Education.This session examines ethical considerations of AI in education, including bias, privacy, academic integrity, and responsible use, while helping faculty guide students toward critical and ethical engagement with AI.
5. Designing GenAI-Enhanced Educational Media with Google AI Studio. This session focuses on using AI tools to design and produce educational media, such as interactive content, visual materials, and learning resources that enhance student engagement and understanding.

Assessment: The assessment requirement for the course is to submit a brief reflection note after each session.

Instructors

Instructor in charge: Dr. Yukyeong Song (TPTE)

Instructor: Wei Wang (TPTE)

Session instructors:

1. Dr. David Des Armier, University of Wyoming
2. Dr. Haseeb Qureshi & Dr. Whit Whitworth, University of Tennessee, Knoxville
3. Dr. Chenglu Li, University of Utah & Dr. Jina Lee, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
4. Dr. Jason Johnston, University of Tennessee, Knoxville; Dr. Greg Kessler & Hyunjoo Moon, Ohio University
5. Dr. Jewoong Moon, University of Alabama. 

• Time to complete: 2 hours each session
• Audience: Higher education faculty, graduate assistants, instructional designers and academic support staff, educators interested in AI integration in teaching and learning
• Credit: Auto-generated certificate of completion
• Offered by Theory and Practice in Teacher Education (TPTE) in College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences (CEHHS), University of Tennessee, Knoxville