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NURS 178: Culminating Project

Research, Critical Thinking, Policy

Reflection on Instructional Change:

I chose to implement the "Empowering Students to use AI: Using GenAI to support your learning". I chose this because I felt it would help students to learn a way to use AI to support their learning without using AI to generate content for them. This would familiarize them with AI prompts as well as the opportunity to fact check the content that AI created for them. I integrated this into a current assignment in which they must research policies related to an issue they are addressing in a chosen community. I created instructions for them on how to download an AI tool, give the AI a prompt and narrow this prompt if necessary, then verify the output and it's relevance to their topic. Once they completed these steps they chose three policies and summarized them without the help of AI to include in their final paper. I then had them submit a reflection on this process.

This assignment helped me to find ways to use AI in teaching that would help support student learning.

Student responses:

What was the most useful? "The speed in which it could create a list", "Easy to use", and "Helped to navigate complicated information/websites".

What was the biggest challenge? "Checking the accuracy", "Creating a prompt that gave you the results that were pertinent to the chosen topic and community", "Making sure the information was current", and "Unsettling to use as first time users".

What surprised you about using AI? "How helpful it was with providing links to the information provided", "Helpful, how specific a person can get when asking for information", and "How current and relevant the information was".

The FLC helped me to better understand the full scope of what AI can do in supporting teachers and students. The following were the most influential to me and why:

ACUE Gen AI Course Activities:
- Empowering Students Using AI: Helping students to understand the way AI can be used to support learning and the importance of checking the information that it produces.
- Writing Effective Prompts: This probably had the biggest impact on me. Understanding how to create prompts that produce the results you want and then narrowing down or changing the results based upon tone, age, reading level, etc.
CTL "Observe and Analyze" synchronous zoom session with your colleagues: This was a great opportunity to not only share what I learning, but to also see what others did to get ideas from them.

An "aha" moment for me with the "observe and analyze" session was that while we can create an assignment with some basic instruction on how to use AI for the task, it may also be important to go a little further with learning about AI, such as a practice on creating prompts.

Evidence of Instructional Change

Evidence of instructional change
Policy Search Using AI Assignment Instructions	Student Reflections on the use of AI	ACUE Badge for Writing Effective Prompts (which I felt was the most important for a foundation in the use of AI)

Practice and Reflect Teaching and Learning with AI:

This has impacted my teaching practices by giving me more tools as an instructor, such as creating assignments and rubrics using AI and how to integrate the use of AI into assignments for students.

Course Syllabus

Course Syllabus and Schedule: The course syllabus and schedule are linked. We have had language regarding the use of AI in the course syllabus prior to taking this FLC and it is reflected in the linked syllabus. The course schedule reflects the placement of the assignment created for students to use and reflect upon AI.

Faculty Bio

Faculty bio
	Faculty Bio: I have been teaching at CSUS since 2010. I currently teach in the RN to BSN program as well as the Undergraduate BSN program. Before I began teaching I worked as a Labor & Delivery nurse at San Joaquin General Hospital, and as a school nurse for Stockton Unified School District. While working as a school nurse in SUSD, I worked with a colleague to apply for and was awarded a Healthy Start grant for one of the high schools in our district. While working with community resources and the district to put a comprehensive health center program together for this school, I found my passion in community health nursing. During this time, I earned my MSN in Nursing Education from CSU Dominguez Hills and began teaching part time. Seeing the ah-ha moment when students understand the importance of holistic care is one of my favorite things! When I decided to teach full-time I went back to school and earned my DNP from a consortium between CSU Fresno and CSU San Jose. When I’m not teaching, I enjoy spending time traveling with my family.

Funding
	This work was supported by: US Department of Education Hispanic Serving Institution Project TECH4Equity US Department of Education Hispanic Serving Institution Project STEM4Equity P031C210012 *Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation or the US Department of Education.