Guidelines not policies: The University of Texas at San Antonio’s approach to gen AI

From an academic integrity perspective, the dawn of ChatGPT led many to worry that students would misuse AI to cheat. There was also concern that an overreliance on AI tools could undermine critical thinking and problem-solving skills. In response, some institutions have adopted a conservative approach to AI, imposing limits on use and favoring a ‘wait and see’ approach. But not The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA).

Academic technology has become an industry in itself over the past 20 years, and has totally reframed what’s possible on campus. And AI is just one of these technologies.

Melissa Vito, vice provost for academic innovation at UTSA, admits she first heard about ChatGPT while getting her hair cut in 2022, and immediately thought the university needed to get ahead of it. Not so they could limit or control AI use, but rather to frame the narrative around it because much of what was being said about it was negative. She didn’t want these perceptions to taint staff and students’ ideas of what AI could and couldn’t do.

Working closely with her colleague Kendra Ketchum, VP for information management and technology, they started by putting the necessary operational pieces of the puzzle in place to enable secure adoption across the university. “We immediately looked at tools like Microsoft 365 Copilot because we already had a Microsoft 365 license,” says Ketchum. “We were happy to pay a little more for the licensing to use a tool we already knew how to support from an operational perspective, making it possible for faculty to test the waters rolling out small AI initiatives. But this didn’t mean that anyone could do whatever they wanted.”

Framing the guardrails

According to Ketchum, they were very deliberate about not developing restrictive policies around the use of AI. Rather, they put together AI adoption guidelines in consultation with experts and analysts from IDC and Gartner, as well as their legal and cybersecurity team. “We already have acceptable use and academic integrity policies,” says Vito. “We have all the policies we need. But what we needed to focus on was learning, and how we could creatively experiment with this technology so we could enhance our academic goals and improve the student experience. When you work with something that’s evolving all the time, putting a policy in place that’s hard to change can really squash innovation.” Ketchum agrees.

Shortly after ChatGPT was launched, Ketchum noticed her service technicians were using the AI chatbot to construct answers to queries and resolve tickets, and the responses they got were well put together and professional. “They weren’t putting any proprietary information into the platform or doing anything they shouldn’t be doing; they were just using it to work a little smarter,” she says. “If people are already using these tools, we knew we had to respond operationally so we could support their rollout across campus with the necessary levels of literacy.”

A lot of people, when confronted with change, want certainty, says Vito. “I think there were people who hoped for policy because they aren’t comfortable with grey areas,” she adds. “Instead, we gave them more of a playground they could use to learn and experiment.” Nothing was mandated, she emphasizes, with no pressure put on staff or faculty to use this technology if they didn’t want to use it. “But it was important for us to be very inclusive in our conversations about these tools, explaining how they can be helpful and where they can add value,” says Ketchum.

Pace of progress

For other academic institutions looking to develop their own approach to AI, Ketchum’s advice is to start small, find the one tool that could work, and give it a try using existing guidelines and best practices. Vito believes it’s important to always keep your eye on the prize, explaining they’ve already been working on improving digital literacy across the university, and that this is just an evolution of that.

Vito also stresses the importance of bringing everyone along on the journey. “When people are invited to participate in things, they feel like they’re part of something,” she says. “And then a lot of this stuff changes from being intimidating to being rather exciting.”