{"685732":{"#nid":"685732","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Teaching at the Speed of AI: Professor Uses Digital Twin to Teach About GenAI","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EInstructors creating online courses have long faced a tradeoff: use text-based materials that are easy to update, or invest in engaging but time-consuming video formats. As a result, learners often get either flexibility or immersion, but rarely both.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cIn a field that moves as fast as artificial intelligence, it\u2019s important to be able to update material frequently,\u201d says David Joyner, executive director of online education in the College of Computing. \u201cThat\u2019s usually a problem because re-recording means going back into the studio and trying to make the new content fit in with the old.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EJoyner\u2019s latest massive open online course (MOOC), \u003Cem\u003EFoundations of Generative AI\u003C\/em\u003E, uses artificial intelligence to solve that challenge. Images for the course are created using Sora and DALL\u00b7E 3, while early drafts of quizzes were generated by GPT-5. The course also uses Grady, an AI autograder that provides feedback on open-ended essays.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe most striking innovation is DAI-vid (pronounced day-eye-vid), a video avatar of Joyner that leads the instruction. To create it, Joyner uploaded a five-minute clip of himself to the generative AI platform HeyGen, along with course scripts and other inputs. The result is a lifelike digital instructor who can let Joyner update his lessons far more easily.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWith AI, we can just modify the text and have the updated video pop right out,\u201d Joyner says. \u201cIt takes minutes at my desk instead of an hour in the studio.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThis approach allows Joyner to keep course materials current and produce new videos entirely on his own. \u201cIt\u2019s strange, but in a lot of ways this course feels more like it\u2019s mine than the ones where I\u2019m on camera,\u201d he says. \u201cBecause AI lets me handle every part of production myself, the finished product feels like my complete work.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EJoyner sees this experiment as an example of AI\u2019s potential to enhance human talent rather than replace it. \u201cGive me AI and I can do five times more than I could alone,\u201d he says. \u201cBut give it to our professional video producers, and they will still far outpace me, because expertise matters most. AI just amplifies it.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cem\u003EFoundations of Generative AI\u003C\/em\u003E is now available on edX, and the same material is also part of the OMSCS course CS7637: Knowledge-Based AI.\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Tech\u2019s David Joyner built a digital twin to teach his new \u003Cem\u003EFoundations of Generative AI\u003C\/em\u003E course. The lifelike avatar lets him update lessons in minutes\u2014showing how AI can amplify, not replace, human creativity and expertise.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/div\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Georgia Tech\u2019s David Joyner is using generative AI to reinvent online teaching, blending human expertise with AI tools to create courses that evolve as fast as the technology they explore."}],"uid":"36756","created_gmt":"2025-10-15 22:21:34","changed_gmt":"2025-10-15 22:22:01","author":"jalderman3","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","location":"Atlanta, GA","dateline":{"date":"2025-10-15T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2025-10-15T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"groups":[{"id":"660375","name":"Lifetime Learning"}],"categories":[{"id":"194606","name":"Artificial Intelligence"},{"id":"153","name":"Computer Science\/Information Technology and Security"},{"id":"42911","name":"Education"}],"keywords":[],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"193655","name":"Artificial Intelligence at Georgia Tech"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[],"email":[],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}