Introduction

An interdisciplinary project team, comprising faculty, staff, and students from two Colleges in University College Dublin (UCD), came together in April 2023 to collaboratively work on a SATLE funded project with the following aims:

• Undertake a critical evaluation of the current use of high-profile (Chat GPT, Bing etc) AI applications within three UCD schools, using the DigComp 2.2^[1] competences framework.
• Use findings of this evaluation to co-develop a collaboratively designed online ‘AI Readiness’ resource for faculty and students.
• Co-develop an AI digital capabilities matrix to facilitate contextualisation of the ‘AI Readiness’ resources across different disciplines in the university.

This student guidebook is the product of work completed by the SATLE ‘Are You AI Ready?’ project team to date.

Project leads: Orla Daly (Technology Enhanced Learning Manager, School of Nursing, Midwifery & Health Systems) & Liam Fogarty (Senior Project Manager, Educational Technology Services)

Project Coordinator: Ashley Bough (School of Education, PhD candidate)

Student Team: Theresa Schilling, Tara Redmond, Dylan McKeever

Faculty & Professional Staff Team Members: Associate Professor Eileen Furlong (School of Nursing, Midwifery & Health Systems); Dr Ernesto Vasquez del Aguila (School of Social Policy, Social Work & Social Justice); Dr Rachel Farrell (School of Education), Andrew Woods (College of Social Sciences & Law), Dr Sarah Morton (College of Social Sciences & Law)

This resource is presented with humility and an awareness of its limitations. The main objective of the project team is to equip you with a basic knowledge of GenAI and offer insights into how you can effectively and ethically use different GenAI tools in your studies.

As an emerging technology, GenAI is constantly progressing, with new models, architectures, and applications being developed at a remarkable speed. Considering the rapid emergence of GenAI since 2022, it is entirely understandable that you may find it difficult to fully grasp or understand every topic covered in this resource.

In using this resource, you are not expected to develop or possess a complete or deep understanding of this complex and rapidly advancing technology. Instead, we suggest using it to focus on understanding some fundamental GenAI concepts, investigating the potential benefits and drawbacks of incorporating GenAI in your studies, and engaging with the material as needed while you broaden your understanding of GenAI.

If you have any suggestions or recommendations about how the resource can be improved to better meet your GenAI learning requirements, please let us know by completing the ‘Your Voice Matters‘ survey.

It would be unrealistic to claim that this one resource can equip you to understand all aspects of GenAI, and its implications for you as a student in higher education.  Keeping pace with the swift evolution of GenAI models and tool development presents a continuous challenge, and is expected to remain so for some time into the future.

The content of this resource has been compiled from several excellent open educational resources that were created by educational developers, educators, researchers and students at other post-secondary institutions and universities around the world. The SATLE ‘Are You AI Ready?’ project team has carefully curated the content and added our own content to create this customized resource for students at UCD. We hope you will share with us your reactions, questions, and suggestions. The resource will be updated – it will have to be updated – and we want to hear from you where we need to make changes, and do more to meet your GenAI learning needs.

Attribution: Adapted from Generative Artificial Intelligence in Teaching and Learning Copyright © 2023 by  Centre for Faculty Development and Teaching Innovation, Centennial College is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.