The University of Tulsa encourages the use of Microsoft's Copilot LLM.
When you use your TU SSO credentials to login to Copilot, you are accessing an enterprise-protected version of Copilot. Not only does this enterprise account provide an extra layer of security, it also allows Copilot to seamless integrate into your existing Microsoft applications.
It requires the Edge browser to work seamlessly.
When choosing a generative-AI tool it is important to consider what you need the tool to assist you with. Are you looking to have a difficult concept broken down? Do you need help judging the tone of writing? Not sure which search terms you could use to find articles in a database? Curious to see if your wording is as clear and direct as you believe it to be? All of these scenarios could benefit from the assistive use of a generative-AI tool.
Not all generative-AI tools are built the same, so it is important to know what the tool was designed to do. When considering a large language model (Copilot, ChatGPT, Perplexity) try using it like a Socratic partner. LLMs can take in large amounts of text with detailed language which makes them a great choice for brainstorming or conceptual understanding. However, there are also many tools that are more single-task oriented, which can help you with every day tasks in addition to your academic life.
Regardless of the tool you choose, you need to write prompts that are CLEAR, and remember it is still your responsibility to fact check any information. This page outlines some important notes on specific tools, their intended uses, and guidelines for creating improved prompts that will yield better results.
The CLEAR Framework for Generative AI Prompt Engineering was developed by Leo S. Lo.
| CLEAR Framework's 5 Frames | User Prompt Examples |
| Concise: Brevity and clarity | Explain preventative care and why it's important. |
| Logical: Structured and coherent | List the steps of identifying dark matter in the universe. |
| Explicit: Clear outcome specifications | I am writing an undergraduate level research paper for a research methods class on the importance of identifying fake news. Write a list of 5 possible dangers if people are not able to identify misinformation. |
| Adaptive: Flexibility and customization | If a prompt like "Tell me about the fall of the Roman empire" produces generic answers, we can update and customize our prompt to address our information need, such as "What do most historians agree was the major cause of the Roman Empire's collapse?" |
| Reflective: Evaluate and improve your prompts based on your evaluation of the gen AI responses | After receiving AI-generated content on the benefits of a plant-based diet, evaluate the response's accuracy, relevance, and completeness. Use insights from the evaluation to refine future prompts, such as asking for more specific benefits or focusing on certain aspects of a plant-based diet. |
Parts of this table are adapted (with changes) or reused from a guide created by Bronte Chiang at the University of Calgary.
Below are some suggest tools and the capabilities of the tools
| Copilot | You will want to use the Microsoft Edge browser when accessing Copilot. Because this LLM was designed by Microsoft, the Edge browser helps it work effectively. In additional to the natural language features that most LLMs feature, Copilot allows you to integrate existing Microsoft applications such as Word or Excel to increase productivity. As stated above, TU has an enterprise account with Copilot and encourages the use of this LLM. |
| Perplexity | This is one of the few LLM tools that was designed for scholarly research and academic environments. It does not require you to create an account for use, but it is suggested so you can save your searches. It generates its responses by using websites (both scholarly and popular) and typically cites the information in the response. Though it can source from scholarly sources, it cannot get around paywalls and the cited information is often pulled from only abstracts of articles and not the full text. |
| Goblin Tools | An excellent single-use AI tool that helps you with time and task management, it can check for tone in writing, and can assist with rewording emails. If you are unfamiliar with generative-AI tools, this is a great one to start with. This is tool that has both academic and everyday life applications. |
| Research Rabbit | A "forever free" way to deepen your research and literature hunting, this tool allows you to connect articles or books you have already found and expand the connections to other sources. This is a citation-based literature mapping tool, and is another great example of single-task generative-AI. You will need to create an account to begin using, but it is a excellent tool for beginning humanities scholars. |
| For a comprehensive list of generative-AI tools and products, check out ITHAKA's Generative AI Product Tracker. | |
Information contained on this website is educational in nature and does not represent the generative-AI use policies for the entirety of The University of Tulsa. If you have questions about using generative-AI tools for your course work or in your department, McFarlin encourages you to reach out to your professors or department chairs and request their generative-AI or AI policies.
