Some people come to artificial intelligence through the technology itself. Dr. Valentine Johns Associate Director, Clermont College Learning Commons, arrived there through a student success challenge: how to provide meaningful academic support to students whose lives and schedules do not always align with traditional service hours.
“My interest in AI grew out of a student success challenge,” Johns said. “I began asking how we could provide meaningful academic support whenever students needed it, regardless of location or time zone.”
That question became increasingly important as online and asynchronous learning grew after the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly at the University of Cincinnati Clermont College. Many students balance school with jobs, families and other responsibilities. They may need help outside conventional tutoring hours or while studying away from campus.
Johns began exploring whether AI could extend some of the strongest elements of tutoring, including personalized guidance, critical thinking and student engagement, while making those resources available on demand.
That idea is now taking shape through a network of AI-powered learning agents designed to support students at different points in their academic journeys. Bearcats Study Pal uses Socratic questioning to guide learning and was awarded the Cloudforce Frontier Award for Best Agent. Bearcats Genius provides foundational explanations, while Bearcats Test Prepper helps students prepare for assessments. The agents operate through an integrated workflow with academic integrity guardrails.
The work has also expanded to include writing assistants, research helpers, workshop agents and course-specific agents developed in partnership with faculty. The aim is not simply to provide faster answers. It is to help students engage more meaningfully with course material while preserving expectations for responsible use.
“I hope AI helps make learning more accessible, engaging and effective for students,” Johns said. “Beyond improving academic performance, I want students to feel more confident, motivated and connected to their coursework.”
The promise, in Johns’ view, is not only convenience. It is access.
That access could be especially meaningful for non-traditional learners, online students and those with limited access to conventional academic support. Johns also sees opportunities for faculty to provide more personalized assistance at scale and for staff to improve services and efficiency. In time, practices developed through this work could be shared with other educational institutions pursuing responsible AI adoption.
What began as a small side project has grown into a broader initiative involving student developers, faculty partnerships and multiple AI projects. That growth brings operational as well as educational challenges. Sustaining the effort requires time, resources and coordination, along with a careful balance between experimentation, academic integrity expectations and individual faculty preferences about AI use.
Johns said the initiative is responding by building partnerships, creating leadership structures within student teams and working with college and university leaders to pursue sustainable support and funding models. The approach reflects a larger lesson: effective AI adoption depends on more than selecting a tool. It requires collaboration among students, faculty, staff and leaders, with clear expectations for how the technology will support teaching and learning.
Johns chooses AI tools according to the problem he is trying to solve. Within UC, BearcatGPT is particularly important because it provides a platform for developing and deploying custom AI agents focused on student success.
He also uses Perplexity for research, source citation and project organization. He has been impressed by the evolution of Microsoft Copilot, particularly its ability to analyze data, generate insights and streamline professional tasks.
Still, Johns’ advice to people interested in AI is not to begin by comparing every available platform. Start with a real need, he says, and learn through practical use.
“Start using it,” Johns said. “Like any tool, you learn by doing.”
He cautions against becoming overwhelmed by headlines, model comparisons or debates about AI’s future. Analysis paralysis, he said, can keep people from moving beyond discussion and into experimentation. “The best way to learn is to engage with the technology, explore its capabilities and discover practical applications in your own work,” he said.
That practical mindset connects directly to UC’s mission. Johns places student success at the center of the initiative and sees the work as a way to create opportunities, advance learning and serve communities through innovation. By exploring new approaches to teaching and learning while maintaining commitments to academic integrity and responsible use, he believes the effort contributes to UC’s “Next Lives Here” vision.
What lingers after a conversation with Johns is the sense that innovation does not require certainty about what tomorrow will bring. It requires a willingness to identify a real need, begin thoughtfully and build with students at the center.
Johns captures that philosophy with a simple image: “If I keep worrying about the storm that’s going to happen tomorrow, I’m not going to plant any seeds today.”
Achievements & Recognition
Peer reviewed articles
Learn more about: Dr. Valentine Johns Achievements & Publications please view his E-Professional Profile
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