LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: I'm Dr. Lisa Mednick Takami. I have the honor to serve as Special Project Director for CAEP TAP at NOCE. I'm joined this morning by Dulce Delgadillo, who's Director of the Office of Institutional Research and Planning at NOCE, and our CAEP TAP at NOCE colleagues, Diana Martinez, who serves as our Data Technician and Ute Maschke, who serves as our Technical Assistance Content Expert and a special guest, Dr. Jarek Janio, who is Faculty and Faculty Coordinator at Santa Ana college. 

At this time, I would also like to acknowledge our state leadership from the Chancellor's Office Mayra Diaz, Cora Rainey, Sanjay Mehta. I would also like to recognize our state leadership from California Department of Education, Dr. Carolyn Zachry, Diana Battista, and Neil Kelly and our colleagues in the integrated CAEP TAP office. Mandilee Gonzales, Renee Collins, and Holly Clark. Together, we serve more than 460,000 students in the state of California through the CAEP TAP integrated office. 

We are excited to welcome you to this particular webinar that really is continuing conversations that began at CAEP Summit. And as Ute really eloquently put to me when we were speaking about a technical assistance request earlier this week that we're really to-- we're striving to continue conversations that started at CAEP Summit because there truly is an opportunity to explore further opportunities that AI offers to our CAEP consortiums. So, as you are coming in, please do introduce yourself and your affiliation in the chat. And I will go ahead and get started with our objectives. 

So, as mentioned, we are continuing, if you attended the CAEP Summit, either in person or virtually or you didn't, there were a lot of fantastic discussions around AI and I saw a colleague, a moment ago whose session I had attended. And we are really seeking to further those conversations and using AI as a complementary tool for classroom as well as efficiency and consortia and office operations. 

And with our combined presentation this morning, we seek to demonstrate practical CAEP content applications for CAEP instructors and non-credit faculty, and that will be Dr. Janio's section. And then we will be introducing AI as a tool for technical assistance requests, and Diana will go more into that a little bit later. Finally, our objective is to really stay current and follow technological trends in the use of AI in adult education. 

So our agenda, our first section is mentioned, we'll feature Dr. Jarek Janio who will be talking about AI in CAEP adult ESL applications and as it relates to other CAEP disciplines. And then Diana will take it away, and she will be talking about CAEP TAP at NOCE and how she's been experimenting and using AI as a self-serve tool for TA requests, reduced turnaround time, and document efficiency. As always, we will have time for questions and discussion. 

Because Dr. Janio has other commitments this morning, as faculty, we will take any questions for Jarek when he finishes his segment, and then we'll have our general Q&A session towards the end. And then we will have our closing activities, which always include a survey because we are a research department and we take your feedback seriously. I'll now turn it over to Ute who will take care of some housekeeping items. Ute. 

UTE MASCHKE: Good morning, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us on that lovely Friday. It's at least sunny where I am. I hope it's sunny where you are. As always, this meeting is being recorded, and we will release the mediated recording on our CAEP website as soon as possible. 

And as Lisa just mentioned, please complete the survey at the end of this webinar. We deeply value your feedback, and use it to improve our webinars. As always, but never not to-- I always want to mention that we are a safe space and where curiosity and grace and respect for each other are important and are our pursuit, if you will. 

So as always, we encourage you to be present and intentional, respect all our other opinions, and be open to conflicting views. AI might be one of those areas where we have many, many opinions and many, many conflicting views. This is our space to bridge boundaries and explore new opportunities. 

And with that, allow me to introduce our guest, Dr. Jarek Janio. He is, as Lisa mentioned, an Associate Professor and Faculty Coordinator at Santa Ana College, and truly one of our experts as far as AI and its integration into our educational environments are concerned. Thank you so much for joining us, Dr. Janio. 

JAREK JANIO: Good morning. Good morning. Thank you very much. Thank you for the kind words, for very warm invitation. And I'm just absolutely honored to be here. 

So thank you. Thank you very much. I'm looking forward to the presentation and the conversation. So, as I speak, don't hesitate to just raise your hand, and I'll be happy to address questions as I come along. 

Perfect. Thank you so much. So, again, good morning, everyone. My name is Jarek Janio. I'm the WIOA Program Coordinator from Santa Ana College School of Continuing Education. 

And yes, I've been involved in the AI questions pretty much since the inception. As soon as I found out what ChatGPT can do, I started experimenting with it. And here we are almost exactly to the day, two years later, after ChatGPT has been released. 

And let me just go back a little bit in the history to put like an maybe underlying assumptions as to where our discussions are heading. So back in the '50s, there was this philosopher Martin Heidegger who said that technology-- in his book about question about technology, he made the point that technology as a tool reveals human nature. It reveals human nature. 

And I would like to probably use this as a leading thought for our discussion. Because we are all educators. And with AI as when AI was released, all of a sudden, we found ourselves struggling with the idea of what do we do with our students? What do we do in our classrooms? How do we apply it? 

What is my daily practice now? And what came as probably one of the leading questions well, what are we going to do if students start to cheat? And I think that's a very, very revealing question about us as educators, because what are students doing in our classrooms? Are they cheating or are they learning? 

Are we responsible for skills and competencies? Or are we responsible for catching them doing something against our rules? And I think that's a very, very revealing thought. And I would like to start the conversation with that, considering that we are dealing-- our populations are students who are most vulnerable in our society. 

These are the students who have not made it to UC system, Cal State system, even community colleges credit part. They are the ones for whom we are the last hope or perhaps the first hope at better life. So ultimately, it seems like the message is slowly getting across that while educators are perhaps stuck on this idea that our students are going to be doing something against our rules, the employers for whom our students are getting ready are ready for them. 

And you know what they are going to be expecting. They are going to be expecting AI tools in the hands of our graduates, in the hands of our students. See, in today's workplace, nobody's going to be waiting for you to draft an email that you're going to spend 15 minutes maybe half an hour drafting. AI can do it in seconds. 

Nobody's going to be waiting for you to prepare a presentation for days or weeks on end, like we used to. With the ChatGPT help and other AI tools, you can do it, again, in seconds. So now all of a sudden, especially employers who are always so efficient and all adults who are always so pragmatic are going to be focused on the content, the content, which means the message. What is it that you're trying to say? 

So I suspect that perhaps-- again, I think it's just a matter of months now-- we will not need any experts like myself. We'll just be talking to our avatars back and forth. But that's a reality that we'll deal with when it happens. 

So the issue here is that the expectations are changing. And educators, us, we have to figure out how to win the battle for student agency so that students are not or even us, we are not reacting with ChatGPT like we used to with any other type of technology, meaning, OK, I need to know something. Please, give me the answer. 

There is much, much, much, much more to it. And that would be taking responsibility for our own learning. Why is it important? Because now when I have a question, I don't have to send an email or research first somebody's name, send an email to somebody who knows more, and wait for them to respond or not. 

I don't have to be making phone calls at 3 o'clock in the morning on Friday. Nobody's going to pick up the phone. I can engage in a discussion that's going to take me to a completely new level of understanding of my interaction with reality. And I think that's, again, complete game changer because in the classrooms, we are not the sages in the middle of the stage any longer. And if this has not been made clear to us over the last few decades, where as internet has been evolving, then definitely that's the message that we should be getting with the applications of AI technologies. 

So, again, please keep in mind our students, what is it that they need? Empowerment. What is it that-- what environment do we need to be creating for them? Where they can validate their thinking, where they can validate that their desire for a better life, that their desire to achieve goals can be substantiated, can be supported by the tools that we have to offer for them. So there we go. 

We are teaching English as a second language so that students can get things done in English. These days, they can do it much faster. They can practice English using AI, using the technology that's available to them, to better themselves, to better their lives much faster, much better, much more efficiently. 

When it comes to ABE students and high school students, it's the same thing. All we really need to do is make sure that we ask and help students answer the question why they do what they do. What are those desires? 

What are the goals? Where are you going with this. Here are the tools. Go for it. Now, when it comes to one of probably most important applications, that again became very, very clear with the advent of ChatGPT is that now we all have different questions. 

We come from different backgrounds. We come from different cultures. There it is, ChatGPT and other AI tools are ready to personalize the instruction, personalize our interactions, personalize our questions and answer sessions. 

So we all have different-- we all start at different levels of interactions, and that's where the skill and competency part comes in. As we know in ESL, that's quite obvious. We go from beginning low to beginning, high to intermediate low and so forth, because we operate at different levels. 

And that's true in pretty much any topic, any subject of study. We have sociology 101, sociology 102, sociology 103, and so forth. The same thing happens everywhere, and GPT is there to address it. 

See, students need to know that they can interact with the tool to the extent that they see necessary. They don't have to fear the fact that, hey, maybe I'm in the wrong room. Everybody's so much smarter than I am and I'm just afraid to raise my hand and ask a question. 

Same thing is in any professional settings that they are going to get used to. They need to know that if there is something that they are missing, they don't have to be shy of the fact that there are shortcomings in their understandings. The solution is at hand. So, again, that's the part of the empowerment. 

When it comes to role-play scenarios from my slide, absolutely, those can be replicated at any given time really for unlimited practically number of situations. Yes, there's a couple of tools that I'm going to be talking about in just a minute that address just that. When it comes to speech recognition technology, again, we know our students' backgrounds. We know our backgrounds. 

We come, again, from all kinds of different cultures, from all kinds of different perspectives. Myself, I speak English as a second language. Do you think that I understand everything 100% that's happening in every single meeting that I attend? No, no, no, no. But there is ChatGPT now to the rescue. 

And you know the situations. There are no stupid questions in this meeting. You can rest assured. No, there aren't until you ask one, then everybody knows you're the one who is asking the question and what your shortcomings are. So this is really true, true, true lifesaver in many, many professional situations. 

When it comes to opportunities to practice with other speakers, again, I don't have to bother anybody. I don't have to be asking anybody for favors. The interaction with AI agents is becoming a thing. And again, it's just a matter of months before those agents are going to be present on our computer screens and phone screens lending a hand, helping us understand. 

These days, if you haven't done it, I strongly advise you, encourage you to put the chat app on your phone and talk to it as you drive. I do it all the time, and it's a true life changer. I mean, I have discussions that-- it's forget the music. 

I mean, it's not even the video. Netflix doesn't attract my attention that much, as much as ChatGPT because, again, ChatGPT is what I need personally. So, see, the reflection here is of my personal desires for m my personal realm, which is something that, again, Netflix or lectures or YouTube videos address only superficially because those medium-- I'm sorry-- those materials are made for, let's just say, majority of people right. 

If there is a popular movie, it addresses the need of certain population, like for the most part. When it comes to ChatGPT, I am the only master in the conversation. I am the one that the entity has to respond to. 

And that's what makes it so personal. That's what makes it so engaging. That's what makes it so rewarding. Could I please have the next slide? 

Enhanced accessibility. So I think I mentioned that in a sense of this ubiquitous, that this is such a universal tool that's available to everyone. Now, we may, we should discuss the access as always from the perspective of equity and really access for, again, those students who are most vulnerable in our society. 

Each one of those AI tools is coming up with different tiers of subscriptions, things like that. So that may be an issue at some point. So perhaps that's something that we should figure out as a system, as educational institutions, how we are going to be supporting our students. 

Now, when it comes to the learning option, text, audio, video, when you think about it, we've been talking about different modalities of learning, how we all approach content from different perspectives. I am a visual learner. I am more tactical. I am more this, I am more that. 

Again, we have such a myriad of materials that are available in so many different modalities that, for the most part, we should be able to find ourselves happy. But if we don't, we ask ChatGPT any question we want. So if there is an issue of any kind, you can ask ChatGPT how you can remedy this, which is, again, something that's really truly, truly groundbreaking because the power of that question, power of the question, not necessarily the answer that I'm getting, but the power that I can generate a question in my brain is within me. And that's what needs to be supported in the classroom so that I, as an individual, a student, can address my immediate needs immediately. 

And that realization, starting with teachers, needs to be transferred to the students. They are the ones who need to know that options are available. If there is something that doesn't work, AI is there to help. 

Adjustable learning schedules, again, this is something that's quite obvious already alluded to the fact that we don't have to be waiting for anybody to respond to our email or make a phone call and wait, wait for a callback or have a conversation. With that, I think, there is a huge implication for professional development activities. And again, this is more on faculty rather than students, but this is what's going to transfer to the classroom. 

When you think about it, our professional activities, let's start with that, start in a lecture hall where people lecture. Or we put ourselves in small groups and we hash things out, and we get to talk and we share. And then after the activity is over, what happens? We go home. 

So if there is no follow up because the experts are gone from the classroom, because my colleagues are gone to their homes, what do I do if I have a brilliant idea on Friday night? I need to write it down. And by Monday morning, gosh, what was I thinking when I wrote that? 

So if there is anything that transforms from those professional development activities is usually very, very, very superficial. And we can probably attest to that fact because our system as education is not really changing that much despite the fact of the research that tells us that, hey, grading is not the best way to motivate students to do their work. The Carnegie Unit for credit courses is not really the best way to attest to the fact that students are learning. Course completion is not a guarantee that students have learned anything. 

Graduation, diploma, those are things that have been developed in our civilization for hundreds of years, if not thousands of years. But in reality, what do they mean? So now this realization, if that transfers from faculty, from teachers to students, we have a new coming. We are really at the edge of new ways of looking at what it means to teach and what it means to learn. 

Is it just for me to cover the content and disclose the facts, so to speak. then give students a multiple choice test and hope that they do the best, that they do well? Or is it something that has to do with more, again, with empowerment and making sure that students realize that the fate of their lives is in their hands? Could I please have that? Oh, yes. Thank you very much. 

So this is the next slide. If you haven't tried it, let me see. You know what? I think I can skip the NotebookLM Because it will require five minutes at least introduction. 

But if I could please have that-- that's right-- D-iD, this is an avatar that I have created of myself. I haven't used it with the public. I haven't used it with my students. I will go back to-- go to Notebook in just a second. 

But if you could-- is there any way to open this up at all? The link should be working, if you have live connection to the internet. But anyway, it's an avatar that's a picture of me talking. 

And now you can ask that avatar any question you want, and specifically this one was designed to help students discuss the concept of present perfect tense. So when you click on it, there is my face, and I am talking. So you can ask any question, there is a pause because I'm thinking and then I respond. 

So, again, this is something for the way of the future. Now, with the Notebook, if I were to go back to this for just a moment, is that you can submit to the chatbot there, to the Notebook any material that you like. It will even do things with YouTube videos. 

So let's just say we do that. We found a video of interest that, again, is a one-hour lecture or something and you are going to put-- you put the link in the notebook. And then what happens is that in the matter of seconds, you're going to get a timeline or timeline of events. You're going to get a briefing doc, which is a summary of the document. 

You're going to get frequently asked questions. There is going to be a summary. And then ultimately, there's a couple more features that just I don't remember at this minute. 

At the end of the video, there is-- at the end of the list of things that the Notebook generates, there is a podcast. And the podcast is so naturally sounding. If you ever listen to NPR, it's exactly like that. You just turn any material that you want into a podcast. 

You click the magic button, you listen to it forever. It's just so engaging because there are two people talking about the topic at hand in a matter, I don't know, just usually a podcast is about 5 to 10 minutes. So instead of listening to the whole lecture for two hours, you get the gist of it in a conversation that's very, very, very engaging because again, you're interested in the topic. 

So that's that. Does this conclude my presentation? I think I'm like 10:25 just like we agreed to. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: You're perfect, Jarek. Thank you so much. I know we may have some questions. And I have a question just to make sure I understood. So if I did understand correctly, you had used the Google Notebook in order to generate the avatar, the D-iD avatar? 

JAREK JANIO: You could do it specifically for the script, but these are two different tools. So the Notebook, the Google Notebook is for you to translate the content that's given to you that may be unorganized. It could be a video that you don't have time to watch, just all kinds of notes. 

I think it can take up to-- just imagine this-- up to 50 PDF files of any kind and then it's going to translate everything, make it into a podcast that lasts 10 minutes. So that just gives you an idea of the power of that tool, that, again, if you need to understand something, then it's going to give you an overview instantly. Nothing of research, reading for hours on end, and lock the door and Nobody comes in next three hours, I'm reading my stuff. No, no, no, none of that. You can do it in your car. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: That's fantastic. We'll make sure, Jarek, to drop both of the links for this in the chat so that our attendees have the opportunity to try it, if they haven't. Are there any questions for Jarek in the time that he has remaining. Please feel free to put a question in the chat or otherwise come off of mic and ask the question directly. 

UTE MASCHKE: We had one in the chat. Jarek, the question is, which one is your favorite? There are so many AI applications out there now and so many AI tools. What are your favorites? 

JAREK JANIO: Nothing beats ChatGPT at least, maybe because I started with it. But truly, I think it's most consistent. But then again, I do pay a subscription of $20 per month. And I am very, very, very happy with it. 

So again, when it comes to script, yes, I go to ChatGPT to generate the script on any topic that I want. I can upload the photograph. As a matter of fact, just this summer, I was at the museum, and there is a big picture that everybody's looking at. It's just that it's cordoned off with the barrier you're not supposed to cross. 

And there's the description of that picture on the bottom. So I looked at it, OK, well, nobody can really read what it is. We just look at the picture. 

So I took the picture with ChatGPT and I asked, what is it? And it told me. So that's just, again, I just-- that's just I can only attest to the power. 

Just very quickly to go-- just for a second to what Lisa said about Notebook, please don't underestimate the power of YouTube. If you click there how Google Notebook works, it will tell you so. 

So it's all there. People just post those videos daily. And I have all those feeds. And to be honest, the landscape of AI and access to different tools changes so quickly. I'm afraid to wake up in the morning and open it up because there's going to be something completely new that's going to change my thinking and my expectation for the day. 

[LAUGHTER] 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Jarek, on that note... 

JAREK JANIO: It's just fascinating times that we are living. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: On that note, would it be OK for our colleagues-- we have your contact information twice in the presentation. Would it be OK for colleagues to reach out to you if they have questions as they're experimenting? 

JAREK JANIO: Absolutely, anytime. And I'm also happy to contribute to similar webinars before avatars take over. So I'm here until then. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: That's great. And we may take you up on that. Thank you so very much for sharing your expertise and really giving us the contextual background for our students, why it's such an important and powerful tool for them, the choices that we have at our disposal, and the importance of getting ourselves wet in this, really immersing ourselves in this so that we are able to empower our students. 

So thank you so much. And now we're going to transition to Diana Martinez, who's going to talk about AI in CAEP and technical assistance. Thank you. 

DIANA MARTINEZ: Thank you. Thank you, Lisa. So, as we head in, it's important to understand that AI is not meant to replace or keep top team or field practitioners. Instead, it's a powerful tool that can enhance our abilities and capabilities, allow for quicker self-service on simple queries, and ultimately reduce turnaround time for technical assistance requests. 

What we mean by simple queries are TA requests that can be solved within one to two email exchanges. And this allows us to invest more time on TA requests that are longer term and require one on one assistance throughout a longer period of time. And what gets outputted from AI is directly based on what we as the users input. 

And responses are directly influenced by how specific or how general our instructions or prompts are. And the majority of the TA requests that we receive concerning allowable expenses and most of the time, the solution is hidden within CAEP guides and memos, and AI can help speed this process. Next slide, please. 

So today, we'll be discussing Perplexity. And as we discuss Perplexity today, I want to emphasize that we're not here to suggest that one platform is better than the other. Every platform has its own strengths and limitations, and the choice of which you use should ultimately come down to what works best for you and your team's needs. 

What we do in Perplexity today can be mimicked in ChatGPT and other platforms. And Perplexity Pro-- the paid version-- has advanced AI models and allows for larger uploads. The free version, which we'll be using today, offers basic functionality with limited file uploads. 

Our goal here is to show how these tools, regardless of which platform you choose in the future, can enhance efficiency, improve our ability to provide effective technical assistance, and can keep CAEP TAP up to date with technology trends. Next slide, please. Thank you. 

So the first step, regardless of which platform you use, is to gather the necessary files to serve as resources. For CAEP TAP, we primarily reference the CAEP Fiscal Management Guide, Program Guidance, AB 1491 Memo, and AB 104 Memo. We mainly receive fiscal technical assistance requests, so having them readily available is important. 

For anyone needing access to these documents, they're all available on the CAEP website, and the link here is provided for convenience. However, it's important for your consortium members to incorporate their own local guidance and resources. Using specific materials ensures that responses are tailored to your specific context and needs. 

And this is a template that we use to organize TA details. Here we have it listed as a CC TAP short form template, and it's just a template that we use for documentation and processing while we process the technical assistance requests that we receive. And then once all of these documents are uploaded and organized, we can easily reference it later. And we'll show you in the demo how to upload these documents and ensure that they're well organized within the platform. Next slide, please. 

And then here's a common request that we receive. Can X College purchase an automatic transmission truck-- projected cost at $54,500? This acquisition aims to enhance the effectiveness of Class B license training. 

At your consortium, this question may be phrased as can X College buy Y uniforms or can X College buy Y materials? And it's a common request that we receive at the beginning of every semester or every school year. And we'll be using this specific TA request as an example, during our demo today. Next slide, please. 

Now we're going to head over to the demo. So I'll go ahead and share my screen. Or let's see. So, as you can see here, I'm already logged onto Perplexity. 

But your first step would be to create an account, log in, and then we're going to head over to the space. And there's common terminology used between ChatGPT, Perplexity, and other AI tools. So it all basically means the same thing. 

Space here is just a collaborative space where you can collect ideas. And every space, when you create one, is up to whatever needs or prompt you're trying to solve. So for today, we'll be using the CAEP TAP TA space, which we created earlier. 

Here, we define the prompt, which is user CAEP TAP data technician will input a question related to CAEP and then using the files uploaded reference the relevant files to answer the question in the format of a CC TAP short form request document. And again, here it's a collaborative space. So you can share it within your team if you'd like to in the future after you set up your space. 

And then as you can see here, we're using the free version. So we have a limit of five files uploaded. And again, these files can be found on the CAEP website. And we'll share that-- it's all shared inside the presentation. So once it's all remediated, you can reference it later. 

And we also recommend consortiums to upload their own local guides and memos. Then here we have the TA requests that we discussed earlier. Can X college purchase a truck at this cost? 

And as you can see here, the main source reference is the CAEP Fiscal Management Guide. And to answer, the AI Perplexity responded in this format-- background, guidance, recommendation, and additional considerations. This is the format and process that the CAEP TAP team at NOCE uses when we respond to TA requests. And it didn't generate a yes or no answer, and neither does CAEP TAP when we respond to requests. We always provide relevant points to follow up with and recommendations to the requester. 

And again, this isn't meant to replace the CAEP TAP team. It's just an additional resource and tool that we provide to the CAEP audience. And if you would like any further assistance or need any additional support with both this and just TA request, in general, please feel free to reach out to us. Thank you. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Thank you, Diana. And I want to give credit to Diana, because the idea for this webinar today was, in fact, hers. And because we have a little bit of time, Diana, can you give us a sense-- and then Ute will join you in talking about the importance of validation. But can you give a sense to our attendees how this idea came to you when we were all attending CAEP Summit as a team? 

DIANA MARTINEZ: Of course. So most of the AI sessions that I attended at the CAEP Summit were related to using AI in the classroom, and I thought about how this would be a really important tool to incorporate for the CAEP TAP team just because it would allow us to go over so many documents that are incredibly text heavy. For example, the CAEP Fiscal Management Guide is 47-pages long. And instead of having to do Control-Find on certain terms, which can also be really difficult because so many terms are interchangeable, the AI can just speed this process up. We can input a question and it'll give us at least a general idea of what the answer or response may look like. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Great. And so really what we've done this morning and then I'll turn it over to Ute talk about validation, is presenting AI in two different contexts, one being for the classroom faculty use empowering our students and the other completely different, which is in terms of consortia, office operations, efficiency, both of which we are all learning about as we're doing this webinar. 

We are all experimenting, we're all learning, and we really want to continue to have these conversations, as we did at CAEP Summit, on how best to leverage AI for our students, as well as for consortia operations. Ute. Thank you, Diana. 

UTE MASCHKE: Yes. Thank you, Diana. And thank you, Jarek. I think both Diana and Jarek brought up some very interesting points and important questions, one of which is, as a matter of fact, the power of questions. 

So similar to, I think, as much as we ask our students to do so, we all of us are in the process of learning how to ask, quote unquote, "good questions" and how powerful these questions can be, also to as much as we can detect hallucinations. I'm sure we all have heard about AI tools hallucinating, that is combining facts into something that is not in the end effect anymore. So it is also on us to validate our information, to cross-check, and consider the questions we ask and the resources we use. 

So for all our cap CAEP work where we already know the state guidance, but there's also local guidance, the resources we use for our answers to open questions about budgets or reports do need to consider quite a variety of resources already. And good questions will become more and more important. And somebody in the chat earlier pointed out that there are all these various AI tools and applications. Evaluating which of those are most helpful for us, hallucination free, if possible, will also become more and more important. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Thank you, Ute, for raising that. Let's go ahead and look at the chat and see if there are other questions or if colleagues would like to come off of mic and either ask questions about what was presented today or questions or comments about their use of AI. This is also an opportunity for some discussion. 

We're actually ahead of time today, which rarely happens, so please do. We'll go to the chat first and see if there are any questions there. And then we'll encourage colleagues to come off of mic and either offer a question or a comment. 

UTE MASCHKE: I think something very, very interesting and ironic has happened in the chat. OtterAI chimed in. That's an AI note taking tool, as we all know. And OtterAI said, "It's quiet in here. Are you all done? I will be leaving in one minute unless I hear someone talking." 

There we go. That's the power of AI. There are no questions at the moment. 

DIANA MARTINEZ: And while everyone's thinking of any questions to add to the chat or come off mute, I just want to state again that we're showcasing these tools because we're leveraging their strengths to save time, reduce burden, and overall just provide clearer and more organized guidance to the field. And this also aligns with our goals of promoting more accessible and well-informed support. And just focusing on delivering-- and helping our practitioners focus on delivering education and training. So again, it's just an additional tool that we're providing to the field. And we can always help you use AI,s if you do need any support with that as well. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Thank you, Diana. All right. Does anyone have a question or a comment? Please come off of mic and join the discussion. 

DULCE DELGADILLO: I do. So great topic, everybody. I think that's what we're hearing as well. I do have a question because this came up, in fact, at the CAEP Summit, where there was a lot of concerns as to the security and the information that you are giving and just making being very cautious as to dropping in personal information by other individuals. 

So addresses, I think, sometimes, especially when we're looking at data and we're trying to do maybe like an analysis trend or something, I know that in a lot of data analysis tools, they are starting to incorporate AI. So I don't know. I don't know if anybody else has any interest or if there's any security measures that maybe there's recommendations around or besides don't drop in the most sensitive information. 

I think there was some concern in the CAEP summit in the presentation I was at specifically around voice, like the recording of your voice and those pieces. So I don't know. I don't know if anybody else has anything, but I did want to bring up that security aspect of it as we are engaging with these tools. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Yes. Thank you. Thank you, Dulce, for doing that. That is certainly one of many issues that we heard discussed at CAEP Summit. And do we have any other questions or comments relative to this discussion? 

I did want to acknowledge that we appreciated those who registered today completing the questions about their level of familiarity with AI. Those who registered were between 1, meeting they were no familiarity to 3, little bit of familiarity-- familiarity. Excuse me, it's Friday. So we are all in a learning mode with this, considering all of the different components, the one that Dulce just brought up about security, to what Diana modeled in terms of efficiency, to what Jarek shared in terms of empowering our students and staying ahead of what our students are going to need or will be expected from their future employers while we're staying atop of the pace of technology. So-- 

UTE MASCHKE: There's another question. Molly, do you want to come off mute? 

AUDIENCE: Sure. My question is, I was working with one of our WIOA partners yesterday, and we're trying to figure out engaging students for employability or soft skills for their careers. And so I'm wondering if anybody has used AI for that. 

In particular, we're not seeing a lot of results from purely online instruction, but the in person is also a little bit challenging just because of remote areas and small groups and things like that. So I'm thinking about a hybrid-ish. I don't I'm just tossing it out there since that's something that I'm working on right now. And I wonder if there's a place for AI with that, if anybody's found that. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Thank you, Molly. So I believe the question is AI as an employability tool, an employability assessment. Is that what you mean? 

AUDIENCE: Maybe it could be part of that. It's like a working with a student and then giving some real-time feedback. I'm Not sure how that would look. That it would take it-- it would kind of maybe fall into that place between purely online individual person working with a computer screen, going through lessons and the other end of being with a group of people and having in a job environment coaching another person, one-on-one coaching kind of thing. If there's, what that could be? 

UTE MASCHKE: Mm-hmm. Janice chimed in the chat. "AI for coaching soft skills would be interesting." I believe at the CAEP Summit there was a vendor who was, I think, showing what that might look like to connect students to employment opportunities and the skills they would bring in, but I forgot their name. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Well, I went to one session on, I think, it was called EvalAI. And I believe I saw one of the co-presenters in our audience this morning, but I believe that was related to employability. Is anybody in the Zoom room who might have attended that same session? Maybe not. 

Well, we will keep that in mind, Molly. We are considering doing a part two of this webinar. Diana had a lot of wonderful content, and we wanted to make sure that we gave time to Jarek as well. And so when we get to our survey, please do let us know what you thought of today's webinar as well as what kinds of tools you might want to see. 

So Molly mentioned employability. Are there any other uses of AI in consortial work that are coming to the minds as we're reflecting and as we're wrapping up this morning? 

UTE MASCHKE: Susan, would you mind coming-- would you be OK coming off mute? Because your examples are pretty awesome. 

SUSAN: [LAUGHS] Sure. 

SUSAN: More than happy to help with that. Good morning. How are you? 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Good. 

SUSAN: This has been really interesting. But when you asked for some examples, I'm like, well, I'm using it with a class I teach. Project management classes is one of the things that I do. And for example, we've been talking about we're not allowed to use AI to actually turn in, right, to be the assignment that you turn in. 

But I want them to understand that when they get into the professional world, if they're working in project management, for example, and they need to create an artifact, like a risk register, that they have the ability to use AI for that. It's a wonderful tool when you're working. But you need to actually know what it should look like in the first place, what that artifact should look like in the first place. 

So no, you can't use AI to generate the risk register and turn that into an assignment. But you can take all of your information that you will put with your risk register, feed that to AI, ask it to make a risk register, and then I can have you assess what the results of that are for me as an assignment. And that's actually worked out really well. 

And then also the other application that I have mentioned in chat was for my husband, who is disabled and has some challenges with putting thoughts into words. And he has found ChatGPT to be very, very useful and helpful for him in composing his thoughts and writing letters and working with insurance companies and medical providers. It's just on a practical, personal level, it's been very useful. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Susan, thank you so much for sharing both of those examples. I think in generating these different examples, it really helps us as a community, as a CAEP community to understand the different kinds of possibilities and the multitude of uses as we're all learning these tools. Is there anyone else in the chat, that would like to come off and either ask a question or share a usage? 

DIANA MARTINEZ: I would like to add briefly as well with ChatGPT specifically, they have some pre-built GPTs that the community has just worked on. And community just means the internet community. Lots of people online have created GPTs to help students and adults create resumes, where people can just put in a couple of bullet points and it'll just generate a whole resume based on what you have provided. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Jarek got a question. Jarek, we'll take your question. I just want to read what Myra put in chat. "What's been helpful to me as I slowly step into the AI space and learning of new tools is hearing examples of how others have been using each platform." 

I feel exactly the same way, Myra. We know it has a lot of capabilities, but when you hear and learn how-- hold on a second-- how others have been using and molding it, it has been super helpful to generate ideas. Thank you for that, Myra. Jarek. 

JAREK JANIO: All right, then. So I just would like to, again, suggest one of those, maybe follow up on the ChatGPT first. There are ChatGPT applications that are highly customizable. 

You can create your own small GPTs and little chat bots there. It's one of the options. And you can just configure them so that if you have a number of frequently asked questions from different perspectives, then you can use those applications for your purposes. And again, that's for if you have, let's just say, in counseling, if you have a number of questions that are being repeated by students, you can configure the chat to respond to them consistently. 

The vendor that I would certainly recommend is Pace AI, and they are big on ESL and literacy and English language instruction. And just as we are talking about how to make it work in EL civics, there is under CAEP we have the concept of immigrant integration. And just yesterday, I happened to be talking to a colleague from high school diploma program, and he said with Pace AI now this is going to be possible to do in ABE and high school programs as EL civics has always been a part of ESL instruction. 

But now when we talk about the integrating of immigrants in ABE and high school programs, the activities can be, again, like everything else with AI put on autopilot, and students can actually interact with those materials on their own. We'll just have to figure out how to make it work on our campus. But it looks like we have a green light. So I want to share that. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Yes, that's fantastic. Super exciting. We can take about one more question or comment, a few more questions or comments, and then we'll go into our closing activities. 

UTE MASCHKE: I just wanted to give a shout out to Holly Clark from CAEP TAP. She put the vendor in the chat. And also the session at the CAEP Summit was called AI Revolution in Adult Education-- Bridging the Gap Between Learning and Employment. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Thank you, Holly, for doing that. We appreciate that. And that goes to Molly's question. Jarek, did you have another question? Or is your hand just still up? 

JAREK JANIO: No, sorry. Sorry. I'm using my phone. I didn't lower my hand. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: No worries. No, no, no, no worries. No worries. We love the discussion and the sharing of ideas, and different applications of AI is exactly what we wanted to be able to cover today. So last chance for questions or comments before we go into closing activities. 

UTE MASCHKE: I believe it would be interesting and I think maybe a very, very productive, beneficial conversation for all of us to get together and review various applications that we like, that we've heard about, that we're already using in our work in classroom environments and do like an annotated bibliography. What's good at what? Why am I using it? What are the pros and cons as we dive into this universe of AI? 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: I think that's a fantastic idea. Thank you for suggesting that, Ute. 

JAREK JANIO: Could I please just add to this very quickly? I'm sorry. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: Absolutely. 

JAREK JANIO: So, yes, I agree. I think that discussion needs to continue. The more of us, the better. My suggestion would be that we bring, not only this is a nice shiny tool and that's the newest, but with that presentation would be backed up some kind of a practical solution. 

So I used it to solve this problem when it comes to the classroom, faculty development or student, whatever it is. But it would be always advisable to bring it from a perspective of this pragmatic solution that's going to give us an idea how we approach this problem, how it gets solved, rather than just, OK, now we have this beautiful tool. Let's figure out how to use it on our own kind of thing. So that would just be my two cents. Thank you. 

LISA MEDNICK TAKAMI: No, I think, that makes perfect sense is that we're identifying needs, we're identifying AI apps and solutions, and then what would be the output from the identified need using the app and what would be the solution. To have those three components in a document, as Ute has suggested, would be fantastic. So, as we're transitioning, I would like to encourage those who may not yet be subscribed to our Listserv to go ahead and use the QR code to subscribe to the Listserv. 

We share with CAEP TAP at SCOE all of our communications. There is the Listserv hyperlink, and then there is the email for our technical assistance requests. And so I'll give a minute for those who are perhaps not yet subscribed to the CC Tap Listserv. And then we will go to our final few slides. 

We also encourage you to join our Voices from the Field. So if you are someone who is passionate about AI and would like to continue this conversation, as we are developing subsequent webinars, please do fill out this QR code. You can see a list on the left of some of the topics that we have asked other colleagues. So when we go to plan webinars, we often reference Voices from the Field, if we know there's a particular area within CAEP or CAEP deliverable or a larger area that impacts all of us the way that AI is and will continue to be. Please do feel free to join our Voices from the Field. 

And finally, we want to thank you for joining us on this Friday morning. Our QR code for our survey-- we are research department. We value your feedback, and we take it seriously. So, please do share your feedback on this initial webinar on the uses of AI in CAEP and in CAEP TAP technical assistance. 

Please do feel free to reach out to any of us individually or through the CC TAP, the CAEP TAP technical assistance request email. We do enjoy hearing from everyone in the field, whether it's a shout out to say hi or if it's a specific technical assistance request. As Diana mentioned earlier, part of the impetus in talking about the technical assistance expenditure questions is to speed up the time with which you can either look at these things on your own and/or consult with us on them as we continue to work with the consortia and the California Community Colleges in expanding non-credit education, as well as data accountability and reporting for all the 71 Cape Consortia and the colleges and the college system. 

So I'll give a minute for you to scan your feedback. I wish everyone a wonderful weekend as well as a safe and happy Thanksgiving. And we look forward to connecting with you following the Thanksgiving holiday.