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As generative artificial intelligence services like ChatGPT become more popular among college students, the University of Michigan is working to keep pace by developing its own AI software. The University introduced Maizey in 2023, its first AI chatbot tailored specifically to U-M students and faculty. In an effort to expand campus engagement with the chatbot, the LSA Newnan Academic Advising Center has started incorporating Maizey into student advising.
Maizey can be used for brief, general questions surrounding specific departments and major requirements. Some advisers find adding Maizey to be beneficial, but not without its limitations. In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Mike Stowe, student engagement and communication coordinator at Newnan, said Maizey is intended to serve as a complement to existing resources, not a complete replacement to human advisers.
“The thought process was always, ‘How do we take AI, which exists (and) is being used, and find a way to implement it as an effective tool to supplement the advising that we can do?’” Stowe said. “The tool is always going to be supplemental. The thing that we try to be clear about is this is not advising: it is an informational chatbot that can pull some answers to straightforward logistical questions.”
Stowe said he believes even with AI tools available, in-person appointments will still be a critical resource for students seeking more intensive advising.
“There’s a reason we have human advisors and not just websites or chatbots,” Stowe said. “Somebody who has been doing this for a while, who has professional training, can help you explore those things in a much richer context than you would be able to do by reading catalogs.”
In an email to The Daily, Engineering senior Jack Chen, vice president of the Michigan AI Safety Initiative, said he worried AI’s tendency to make overconfident guesses may hinder its assistive ability.
“It is a generalized tool, and in the absence of directions, it will make a generalized guess which it will proclaim to the student confidently- as if it had personally asked the professor,” Chen wrote. “Even if the advising department had written some guidance docs for the Maizey bot to have on hand, the quality of its guidance is contingent on the quality and correctness of those docs. Ultimately, to get a real answer, you have to set up an advising appointment.”
In an interview with the Daily, LSA sophomore Anthony Walker, president of the AI Business Group, said he believes AI would need access to more student-specific information to be a truly useful advising tool.
“I prefer ChatGPT because it knows my history and context, so I don’t use Maizey much,” Walker said. “If the right tool is presented, people might use AI for advising. But it needs to be detailed — like giving AI access to transcripts or activities.”
Daily Staff Reporter Olivia Aversano can be reached at oavers@umich.edu.
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