Higher education learning materials provider Cengage has launched its GenAI-powered Student Assistant in beta, allowing over 5,000 students to test it throughout the forthcoming fall semester.
The Student Assistant, which is integrated into Cengage's online learning platform MindTap, assists students through their studies by presenting appropriate resources as needed. It provides individualized, timely feedback and enables students to interact with essential topics in novel ways to improve their learning. The Assistant does more than just supply answers; it also helps students understand ideas, apply knowledge, and draw proper conclusions.
"Generative AI (GenAI) presents an immense opportunity to enhance the learning experience, foster student engagement and improve educational outcomes. At Cengage Group, we recognize the importance of taking a thoughtful approach to developing and implementing AI solutions. We have spent a considerable amount of time talking to students, faculty and other industry stakeholders to ensure we introduce a solution that addresses the challenges facing students and educators in the classroom today and upholds the highest standards of academic integrity," said Michael E. Hansen, CEO, Cengage Group.
The Student Assistant is intended to focus on pedagogy, with extensive experience in each specific discipline, but is limited to knowledge of a single course area. Instructors and students, as subject matter experts, assist in training the Assistant to ensure correctness, academic integrity, bias elimination, and appropriate tone setting.
Given the rapid growth of GenAI, Cengage's technology and innovation team is investigating a variety of large language models (LLMs) to guarantee that the optimal model is deployed across disciplines. This strategy differentiates Cengage from other AI-powered assistants and improves the learning experience for students.
According to Cengage's research, instructors and students see the greatest potential for GenAI assistants in areas that require critical thinking and multi-step processes. Another survey by Quizlet highlighted the evolving role of AI in education, revealing significant adoption rates and diverse impacts on students and teachers alike.
The beta review will consider a variety of aspects, including student engagement, learning results, satisfaction, and overall value for both students and educators.
