August 10, 2023: USDLA’s Free Friday Webinar Series starts Aug. 18 — Mark your calendar to learn about “The Ivory Tower of Babel? Concerns and Opportunities for ChatGPT and Artificial Intelligence in Higher Education”

8/10 USDLA Brief

Hello USDLA friends — Mark your calendar for our Free Friday Webinar Series starting up on Aug. 18 when Dr. Adam Wilson and Instructor Allen Shull talk about “The Ivory Tower of Babel? Concerns and Opportunities for ChatGPT and Artificial Intelligence in Higher Education” Scroll down for details, and register here.

Be sure to also register for these upcoming webinars at https://usdla.org/webinars:

  • August 25: “Tapping into Tik Tok: Techniques for Teaching Today” with Shaunice Sasser.
  •  September 1: “Global Educational Mentorship (GEM)” with Toni Hill, Olimpia Leite-Trambly, and Jane Miller.
  • September 8: “Where to Start with IDEAs (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility)? Understanding the Challenges & Opportunities!” with Rosemary Okoiti and Juliet C. Hart.

If you haven’t already: Please complete our survey regarding upcoming Public Policy webinars for 2023-2024. If you want to speak on one of the public policy topics or suggest an expert, click here to complete the proposal form. Webinars are one-hour and include Q&A. Please reply by Friday, September 15, 2023. Questions? Send an email to committee chair Alexandra Salas: asalas@usdla.org.

We’ll be back in touch on Tuesday with our USDLA News. All the best! —  USDLA Communications Committee

Webinar — Friday, August 18, 1-2 pm: The Ivory Tower of Babel? Concerns and Opportunities for ChatGPT and Artificial Intelligence in Higher Education

About the webinar: Just as the Tower of Babel symbolized human achievement and ingenuity, stretching towards the heavens, so too does ChatGPT and related AI technologies leave the world in awe of the rapid and transformative advances in technology, along with the seemingly limitless opportunities for progress.  However, the Tower of Babel’s tragic downfall is a stark warning of the complexities and pitfalls accompanying technological advancement.

In this session: Dr. Adam Wilson (pictured above right) and Allen Shull (pictured left) will examine the potential for ChatGPT and similar technologies, providing examples of how AI can be implemented in faculty workflows, course creation, and student assessments.  Their insights will empower attendees to harness the power of AI in the classroom. Additionally, they will address concerns of academic integrity through ethical pedagogy to meet higher education’s unique challenges as AI continues to reshape the world.

Dr. Adam Wilson is the Director of Online Programs at the University of Tennessee at Martin.  He earned a Ph.D. from the University of Mississippi specializing in African American History and is the author of African American Army Officers of World War I: A Vanguard of Equality in War and Beyond.  Outside his professional interests in the Civil Rights movement, Dr. Wilson has published and presented on student engagement, experiential learning via gamification, online teaching best practices and pedagogy, and instructional technology.

Allen Shull is an instructor of English at the University of Tennessee at Martin, where he has taught through various distance learning modes since 2007. He is currently completing his Ph.D. at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, specializing in the utopian science fiction novels of Iain M. Banks. Mr. Shull has presented on the late Roman, early medieval, Enlightenment, and contemporary literature, focusing on ecology, alterity, idealism, and technological aspects of pedagogy.