Latest news with #CamilleDempsey
Yahoo
18-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Center for Artificial Intelligence opens at PennWest Edinboro
Artificial intelligence is practically unavoidable in today's day and age. It's easily the most rapidly growing technology in the world, which makes it all the more important to understand how it interacts with the information you provide it. National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week — A look inside Erie County 911 Call Center 'AI is not going away. It is racing forward and leaving a lot of people behind. I think there are both opportunities and challenges with ai that we all need to be learning about,' said Dr. Camille Dempsey, director of the PennWest Center for AI and Emerging Technologies. Dempsey said AI comprehension skills have become a big part of workforce development in higher education, with businesses and stakeholders seeking AI-literate college graduates to push them over the top. In response, Dempsey said faculty throughout PennWest are working with robots, researching ethical AI as well as the right ways to implement its use throughout cutting-edge industries. 'We're not about building the AI models. Those are being built by industry and lots of places around the world. Our focus is on using AI to fulfill the mission of the institution and help students be prepared to do good things,' said John Anderson, president of PennWest University. 'It is going to take over parts of our lives. We need to understand how we can use it for good, how we can harness its power to make a difference.' April marks Distracted Driving Awareness Month, travel agencies ask for full attention while driving Pennwest Edinboro kicked off the opening of the center with a panel of AI experts to discuss the ever-changing landscape of artificial intelligence. It's thought to be the first center of its kind in the region doing this sort of work with AI. 'There's a need for information literacy where we're exploring what we need to know to protect our learners and our community, so that we know how to navigate that. There's so much to it. It's in our workflow, it's in our email, it's in Microsoft and Google products, it's in everything,' said Dr. Dempsey. PennWest is doing a large amount of outreach, pushing how best to be prepared for the growth of AI. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
20-02-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
AI in education: How faculty are learning to use, teach the technology
EDINBORO — Artificial intelligence can help educators create and update lesson plans and complete other peripheral tasks so that they can focus more on teaching and research. It can help students gather information needed to complete assignments, check their grammar and format their work in alignment with style guides. It also can help students cheat. Colleges and universities are scrambling to educate themselves about the opportunities and challenges of artificial intelligence and how to harness it to improve teaching and learning. "It's the hottest topic right now in education," said Camille Dempsey, director of Pennsylvania Western University's new Center for Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technologies and associate professor of education at PennWest's Edinboro campus. The biggest challenge is that artificial intelligence is developing so fast that most educators can't keep up with it. "It is one of the fastest-growing technologies I've seen my lifetime. The other two that were transformational were the mobile device and the internet. AI is moving way faster, and it's way more powerful," Dempsey said. PennWest's Center for Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technologies is being designed by faculty, staff and students at all three of the university's campuses to give faculty the tools, understanding and training to incorporate AI in teaching and to help students to become proficient, ethical users of AI, both in learning and in later careers. Expected to be operational this spring, the center additionally will help governments, industry, nonprofits and other community partners leverage the time- and cost-saving opportunities of AI. "School districts are contacting us because they want to know how to advise their teachers on using it and how they work with students so students are using it correctly," Dempsey said. Educators' No. 1 concern with artificial intelligence is that students will use it to cheat, according to a November 2023 Microsoft report on AI in Education. Forty-two percent of U.S. and international educators surveyed for the report indicated that they worry that artificial intelligence will increase student plagiarism and cheating, such as using AI to write reports and essays. Students' No. 1 concern with AI is similar. Fifty-two percent of student surveyed indicated that their biggest worry is that they will be accused of plagiarism and cheating. Cheating concerns generally arise when there is a lack of direction on how a student can use artificial intelligence, said Dempsey, who is a faculty research fellow in AI through the International Society of Technology in Education. She also is a fellow with the EDSAFE AI Alliance, a coalition of organizations focused on fostering the safe and equitable use of AI in education, according to the group's website. "Students don't know what they don't know," Dempsey said. "Just like the rest of us, they are exploring it; they're trying to figure it out, too. That's why having professional development for teachers and universities and schools is really important because it's easy to fall into saying that something is plagiarism when the reality might be that the professor or teacher doesn't have an AI policy," or students aren't properly citing AI use. The key to using AI in education and in other applications is to remain in the pilot's seat, Dempsey said. "Don't give up your human brain. AI certainly can make our lives easier in many ways, but I would never rely on it 100%. I think of AI not only as a teaching assistant but also as a co-pilot. It's assistive; it's assisting what we do." Admission apps: Saving students multiple applications and fees, 'widening the net' for colleges Contact Valerie Myers at vmyers@ This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Student cheating remains a concern as educators learn to embrace AI
