First Insights from the 2025 Generative AI 101 Cohorts

Since February 2025, nearly 100 instructors from all 12 Northwestern schools have participated in the first three cohorts of the Generative AI 101 program, offered by Northwestern IT Teaching and Learning Technologies (TLT). Participants actively explore questions such as, “How do we help our students take ownership of their learning in the age of generative AI (GenAI),” and “What are instructors highlighting in their courses when they incorporate GenAI?”  

Instructors in the Provost’s Advisory Committee on Generative AI-sponsored program learn fundamental functions of GenAI; techniques for citing, source checking, and verifying AI-generated output; how to use Northwestern-licensed Microsoft Copilot tools; and how to develop assignments for use in their own courses. Additionally, winter cohort participants provided feedback on “How to Use Generative AI Responsibly in Academia,” a student-facing AI literacy module available to all Northwestern Instructors via Canvas Commons. 

In the first three cohorts, several questions recurred: 

• How does GenAI authentically fit into my course and field?  

• What skills do my students need to engage with GenAI productively? 

• How can I help my students assess when to use or not use generative AI for learning? 

For many instructors, revisiting the core learning objectives of their courses and fields provided helpful framing for how GenAI topics could connect to what truly mattered in their teaching. Sylvester Johnson, professor of black studies at Northwestern University and 2024 Kluge chair in technology and society at the Library of Congress’s Kluge Center, participated in the winter 2025 cohort of Generative AI 101. His spring 2025 course directly addressed AI in terms of topics and methods. He recounts,  

“Students in my first-year writing class studied the social and cultural dimensions of AI by examining the intersection of race, AI, and the future of humanity. The course was grounded in research methods... Students also learned to use specific AI tools to deepen their engagement with peer-reviewed scholarly research and sets of empirical data about their research topics. 

The result was an engaged class of undergraduates who significantly advanced their knowledge of AI as a socio-technical reality that offers both challenges and opportunities for our complex society. They produced effective writing driven by curiosity and based in competent research, and they demonstrated mastery of new skills that will serve them as students and as career professionals.” 

Professor Johnson’s course demonstrates an approach to integrating GenAI into a course that builds on the foundational skills of writing, research, and critical thinking that are already part of many courses at Northwestern.  

Helping students take ownership of their learning is especially critical when students have access to GenAI tools. Summer 101 cohort participant Charles Yarnoff, professor of instruction in the Cook Family Writing Program, taught a course titled "Generative AI in Academic and Professional Writing” in spring 2025. One technique he used was to ask students to advise new students entering Northwestern in fall 2025. Students shared insights about best practices for exploring GenAI with instructors, recognizing the value of their own learning process, the need to verify AI output, and the risk of over-relying on GenAI. 

A sample of the students’ advice includes: 

1. "Getting familiar with how it creates outputs—through predictive text generation—will help you understand how to not rely on it but rather utilize it as a source of inspiration." 
2. "Don't trust everything AI gives you; be sure to fact check...Trust yourself more than AI." 
3. "If you are using AI, which you might be, just remember that you're the one learning. You're the one following a passion, not a chatbot that you are constantly prompting."

Other Lessons Learned 

• Spending time learning about the strengths and limitations of GenAI tools and their impacts on the field of study helped instructors narrow in on how they wanted to use or not use GenAI in their classes. 

• When planning an assignment that uses GenAI, instructors should create an alternative version of the assignment that students who opt out of using GenAI tools can complete. 

• Instructors can observe a wide range of student reactions to the use or non-use of GenAI in their courses. A clear syllabus policy, opportunities for students to ask questions, and transparency from the instructor about why a specific approach was chosen go a long way in meeting students wherever they are on the topic. 

Many more participants from this year’s Generative AI 101 cohorts will be applying what they learned in the program with their students over the coming quarters. Join the conversation during the next academic year with new sessions of Generative AI 101 and additional workshops from Teaching and Learning Technologies.