Blackboard AI Design Assistant - Frequently Asked Questions

The Blackboard AI Design Assistant is susceptible to the same risks as any use of generative AI. In particular, you should be cautious about the accuracy of information generated by the AI Design Assistant and closely verify the content in rubrics, discussion and journal prompts, and test questions. It is possible for a test question generated by AI to have an incorrect answer marked as correct, as just one example. 

Generative AI models also tend to replicate human biases around gender, race, age, ability, and more. This is particularly apparent when generating images. For example, prompting AI for images of "scientists" tends to result more frequently in images of white men. These biases can harm marginalized populations and reinforce stereotypes.

You can easily modify text-based content generated by the AI Design Assistant, such as Learning Module names and descriptions, rubrics, test questions, and prompts for Discussions and Journals. Once you have accepted the generated content, you can edit the content to modify it.

Images cannot be modified directly in Blackboard, but you can remove the image, generate a new image, or replace it with your own image. You can also download the generated image to edit it offline in an image-editing tool, such as Adobe Photoshop. 

Once you have accepted a suggestion made by the AI Design Assistant, that content is not marked in any way to indicate to students that it was generated by AI. The notable exception is that a rubric generated by the AI Design Assistant will be named "Generated Rubric", which may provide students with an indication that the rubric was generated by AI. You can change the name before grading with the rubric.

The Blackboard AI Design Assistant is built on Microsoft's OpenAI initiative, which incorporates the ChatGPT, GPT-3, GPT-4, and Dall-E 2 models that many outside generative AI tools use, so there is no technical advantage to using an outside tool. In addition, there are several benefits to the AI Design Assistant:

• Privacy and Security: Because it is built on Microsoft's OpenAI and follows Anthology's Trustworthy AI framework, your data is never used to train the AI models, as it would be if you used an outside generative AI tool.
• Better Results: The models and prompts have been tuned specifically for an education context, providing you with more relevant results. 
• Save Time: The AI Design Assistant not only generates content, it also creates the structures needed for that tool type in Blackboard Ultra Course View. For example, when you use the AI Design Assistant to generate test questions, those are pre-built for you instead of requiring you to manually build the test questions in Blackboard.

There is no policy at NIU that would prevent you from using an outside generative AI tool, however, but you should be cautious about any use that might violate existing policies regarding data privacy and security, such as providing student work to an AI platform to ask for a critique, grade, or summary.

Intellectual property rights to content generated by or with support of artificial intelligence is a legal consideration that does not have a clear answer at this time. Recent U.S. course decisions have ruled that the content generated by AI cannot be copyrighted because it was not created by a person. 

As far as ownership of course content generated by AI, it is probably safe to assume for now that NIU, Blackboard/Anthology, and Microsoft OpenAI do not have any copyright claim to the content generated by the AI Design Assistant. Whether you can claim ownership is uncertain. 

As a society and industry, we are still exploring when it is and isn't appropriate to use AI to generate content. This really is a personal decision based on your own values and the pedagogical goals of your course, but here are a few thoughts to guide your thinking. 

Your use of generative AI to develop course materials is substantively different from your student use of AI in their coursework. Faculty are experts in their fields who are developing materials in a professional context (i.e., course materials to support your teaching responsibilities). Faculty are ultimately responsible for the materials they use to teach and can use their expertise to judge the appropriateness and accuracy of those materials. Generative AI can be a tool to increase your productivity, provide inspiration, and help you be a more effective educator.

Students, on the other hand, are learning and still developing that expertise. Using AI in that process could be a valuable learning experience as they build the skills and knowledge that they are mastering in your course, particularly if they will be applying what they learn in a professional setting where AI will be an essential productivity tool. However, AI could also be used in a way that undermines their learning by allowing students to take shortcuts that decrease their mastery. Whether students should use generative AI in your course really depends on the type of learning they are engaging in and the content of the course. 

There is no denying that generative AI has transformed a number of industries, and will continue to do so. It is important that we explore the capabilities and limitations of generative AI as we all navigate when it is and isn't appropriate to use AI tools, to inform our conversations and policies.

It is important to note that the AI Design Assistant in Blackboard is not intended to replace your role as an educator but rather to assist you and help you be more efficient and effective. 

For example, it won't design an entire course for you; your expertise is and will remain essential for establishing learning objectives, selecting content, connecting with and supporting your students, and assessing student learning. The AI Design Assistant can shorten the time required for some of the more arduous tasks of developing course materials and provide inspiration for enhancing your course.