Eight faculty members from across the University are joining forces to explore the impact of generative artificial intelligence on academia as the inaugural cohort of the Duke Faculty Academy.
The academy is a new professional development program designed to promote interdisciplinary collaboration among professors on key topics impacting the faculty experience.
“[The academy] is creating a really rich intellectual environment to breed innovation,” said Sherilynn Black, associate vice provost for faculty and assistant professor in the practice of medical education, who founded the academy.
Academy participants will engage in regular meetings — often led by local leaders and national experts — to generate ideas surrounding the role of generative AI in the faculty experience. The programming will culminate in a project that seeks to create positive change, which the cohort will present at a capstone event in April.
The origins of the academy
Black envisioned the idea for the academy roughly two years ago when she and her colleague Abbas Benmamoun, vice provost for faculty advancement, began hearing overlapping discussions among faculty about emerging issues in academia.
“Wouldn’t it be great if there was a program where we could highlight some of these issues that impact the faculty experience, but also give the faculty an opportunity to work in an interdisciplinary manner, to be a part of positive changes for the campus community?” Black and her colleague had reflected.
In her initial discussions with University deans, Black realized that generative AI was one of the most prevalent topics that faculty were grappling with.
She noted that although there’s a lot of “excitement” about AI, Duke and other higher education institutions tend to be conscious about its shortcomings, including potential biases and environmental impacts. Black believes the academy will offer faculty a chance to be “thoughtful” about these concerns while also rethinking curricula to take advantage of AI tools.
“At the heart of the matter [AI] is still this very emergent technology that has so many varying points for discovery,” she said.
Interdisciplinary discussions
The academy selected cohort members from several areas of Duke — including the School of Law, Fuqua School of Business and School of Nursing — through a nomination process.
“The goal is [that] we would love to be able to create something out of this experience that can be relevant across campus for faculty experience,” Black said. “To do that, you really do need all of these diverse perspectives.”
The cohort began its efforts at the Emerging Pedagogies Summit, hosted by Duke Learning Innovation and Lifetime Education, where participants engaged in topics related to teaching and learning with national experts on generative AI.
“When we went to the first meeting, I was already really blown away because you’re actually working with people from very different areas of the University,” said Eileen Cheng-yin Chow, associate professor of the practice of Asian and Middle Eastern studies and member of the inaugural cohort, who added that she was struck by a faculty member in the School of Nursing’s perspectives on AI, which differed from her own.
Chow said that she wanted to become involved with the academy since she was unsatisfied with current approaches to generative AI — which she felt would wholly dismiss or embrace the technology without nuance — and because she is interested in exploring how machine translation could impact her discipline, describing herself as testing “the obsolescence of [her] own field.”
David Brown, Snow family business distinguished professor in decision sciences and member of the inaugural cohort, teaches classes about how AI tools “work under the hood.” He views the academy as a valuable opportunity to learn how faculty are incorporating AI in their pedagogy.
“One basic thing is to think about collective AI literacy as a university,” Brown said. “… How do we educate everyone on that front?”
Project development
The academy’s recent meetings were oriented around what Black describes as “design thinking exercises,” which investigate approaches to generative AI that are relevant across disciplines. Next, the cohort will explore “intervention design,” which seeks to identify actionable projects that can promote sustained change in the faculty experience.
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“We’re really trying to give them as much freedom as possible to bring their creativity and their expertise and their innovation to come up with something new,” Black said. “This is one of the best things about working on generative AI … There’s so much that’s not known, and this is a really great opportunity for the Duke faculty to be able to take the lead.”
Michael Cary, associate professor, Elizabeth C. Clipp term chair of nursing and member of the inaugural cohort, described work of the academy as “reaffirm[ing] the importance of fostering AI literacy and ethical AI use, especially in fields like healthcare where the stakes are high,” in a Jan. 30 email to The Chronicle.
Cary hopes that the cohort’s final project will promote “AI literacy and ethical practices” among faculty and provide a foundation for training and toolkits that empower faculty and health care leaders to navigate the ethical implications of AI.
“We’re just really excited to be in the middle of this pilot, and the cohort seems really enthusiastic,” Black said, adding that the cohort has already contributed “amazing ideas.”
Kate Haver is a Trinity sophomore and a university news editor of The Chronicle's 120th volume.