Stephen Drew, Chief AI Officer at Ruffalo Noel Levitz, explores the transformative role of AI in higher education. Stephen shares his journey into AI and discusses how conversational AI can enhance university services and improve student engagement, especially once models have improved even more. 

He also highlights the importance of understanding and communicating the limitations of large language models to ensure responsible usage. Additionally, Stephen delves into leveraging data analytics to gain insights, enabling universities to make more informed decisions regarding enrollment and fundraising campaigns. 

Topics discussed:

• The role of conversational AI in improving university services and driving better student engagement and outcomes.


• Importance of creating well-designed, efficient, and explainable machine learning models for educational applications.


• Communicating the limitations of large language models to ensure responsible and ethical usage in educational settings.


• Leveraging data analytics to gain deeper insights into CRM and SIS data for better decision-making in universities.


• Developing targeted marketing and recruitment strategies to help universities meet their enrollment goals.


• Building virtual advisors to assist students in making informed decisions about their career paths and course selections.


• The necessity for universities to establish policies around the appropriate use of AI and data management.


• The challenge of balancing personalization with the ethical implications of using AI in student advising.


• The impact of AI on accelerating the admissions process and improving the overall efficiency of university operations.

(Episode 10)