College of Health Solutions professor integrates ChatGPT into coursework after winning the AI Innovation Challenge

By: Kimberly Linn

With support from the AI Innovation Challenge, Micki Hrncir, an associate teaching professor at the College of Health Solutions, tested the use of ChatGPT as a student aid for her course EXW 450: Social Determinants of Health, with a class size of 37 students.

The AI Innovation Challenge is a proposal-driven competition hosted by the Provost's Office and Enterprise Technology, held during the spring, summer and fall of each year. The winners and their research participants received access to ChatGPT Enterprise for a limited time at no cost to them.

“The event takes place virtually, but I wouldn't refer to it as a single-day event,” said Paul Alvarado, AI Program Manager for the AI Acceleration Team at ASU. “People submit proposals, those proposals are reviewed, winners are announced and then they have the licenses for a limited amount of time at no charge.”

EXW 450 is a six-week course focused on preparing students to write academic proposals. During Hrncir’s Summer 2024 session B course, students were encouraged to use ChatGPT to improve their academic writing skills. They were required to research and write two papers, each five pages or more in length. One of the many encouraged uses of ChatGPT, according to Hrncir, was as a tool for summarizing scientific literature.

“Additionally, I wanted to introduce students to generative artificial intelligence as an academic tool that is supported by their professor,” said Hrncir. “I wanted to lean into the technology and express that not all tools are used for cheating, but for engaging in new content and learning in new ways.”

To assist in the project, Hrncir recruited a former student of the EXW 450 course, Rachel Mercado, as her undergraduate teaching assistant. Mercado and Hrncir met weekly to discuss how ChatGPT was used in the class and to study how artificial intelligence was perceived by students in the learning environment.

“It reminds me of the Office Assistant character, Clippy, from a long time ago, the one where you could ask for help when working on a Microsoft Office document,” said Mercado. “You could enter your questions, and it would tell you where to go; that's what I would compare ChatGPT to.”

By the conclusion of the course, Hrncir and Mercado recognized the benefits of using artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT within academia. They noted that the biggest hurdle is building foundational knowledge early on to enable students to produce meaningful work in an upper-division class.

“Another point is that using ChatGPT made the class feel like double the work because students did not know how to use ChatGPT,” said Mercado. “That being said, students would benefit from learning how to use ChatGPT in an introductory course at ASU or as part of their orientation to ASU.”

Learn more about how ChatGPT was used in this project at the monthly College of Health Solutions AI Community of Practice meetings.