In April of 2025, VABT hosted the first Kelley School of Business Prompt-A-Thon. This innovative event was the first of its kind in a business school. Eighty-nine teams of undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral students competed to solve real business problems using Gen AI. Prizes totaling $3,000 were awarded to the winners. Student submissions were judged by 12 VABT members from various departments.
What are best practices for using AI in today’s classroom? How can faculty learn how to use AI confidently and creatively?
These are questions that Miranda Rodak, a Kelley faculty member in Communication, Professional, and Computer Skills, is exploring in the Digital Gardener AI/Gen AI webinar series. The series is specifically designed to bolster faculty’s understanding of AI as it relates to pedagogical approaches and student learning. Open to the broader public as well, the series includes webinars and online workshops exploring critical AI issues in a collaborative virtual environment. As co-facilitator of this innovative curriculum, Professor Rodak is emerging as a national leader in the fields of virtual business technologies and generative AI.
Garnering national interest, a Digital Gardener webinar recently brought together over 160 faculty representing nearly 100 institutions, including faculty from Brown University, Oregon State University, Stanford University, and Virginia Tech. Additionally, participants may opt to complete a set of requirements to earn a Digital Gardener Initiative AI/Gen AI digital badge and letter of completion.
How can IU students harness AI’s potential to effectively communicate through writing? In Dr. Xin Chen’s BUS-C 204 Business Writing classes, the AI-Integrated Writer’s Workshop for Persuasive Communication equips students to use AI tools both strategically and ethically. Designed as a dynamic and collaborative component of the course, the workshop empowers students to engage critically with AI, enhancing their clarity, creativity, and audience awareness in professional writing. Workshop participants learn how to leverage AI tools to:
Students maintain a log of their AI interactions, later evaluated for effective use of AI tools. Following the completion of their draft, students assess one another’s writing, providing peer feedback for improvement. Additionally, peer feedback itself is reviewed based on being constructive and helpful.
“The writing workshop revealed how much of the drafting process AI can streamline, included helpful peer feedback, and ensured our statement effectively addressed all elements of the rubric.”
2025 workshop participant
Chairperson, Emerging Graduate Programs Professor of Operations and Supply Chain Management, Kelley School of Business Indianapolis
Clinical Assistant Professor Department: Accounting Demeré, B. W., Sedatole, K. L., and Wilson, J. (2022). Counterfeiting and anti-counterfeiting costs: An application of cost of quality concepts. In J. M. Wilson (Ed.) Brand Protection and the Global Risk of Product Counterfeits: A Total Business Solution Approach. Edward Elger Publishing.
Co-Director, Business Analytics Consulting Workshop Senior Lecturer Department: Business Economics & Public Policy
Director, Program on Data Management and Information Governance, Ostrom Workshop Chairperson, Business Law and Ethics Department; Professor of Business Law and Ethics; Adjunct Professor of Law, Indiana University Maurer School Law Raymond, A., and Shackelford, S. J. Nudging the Ostroms’ Vision of the Commons and Polycentric Governance into the Digital Environment. In Global Digital Data Governance: Polycentric Perspectives. Routledge Global Cooperation Series, (2024).
Teaching Professor of Business Communication Department: Communication, Professional, and Computer Skills
Director, Computer Skills Senior Lecturer Kinser, A. S., Kinser, J. E., Hammerle, P., Lending, D., Moriarity, B. P., and Nightingale, J. (2011), Your Office: Microsoft Access 2010 Comprehensive. New York, NY: Pearson Education, Inc.
Boquist-Meyer Faculty Fellow Professor of Finance Associate Editor at the Review of Finance and the Journal of Banking and Finance Dehejia, R. H., and Gupta, N. (2022). Financial Development and Micro-entrepreneurship. Journal of Finance Quantitative Analysis, 57(5), 1834-1861.
Chair, Kelley Direct Program Schuyler F. Otteson Distinguished Fellow for Kelley Direct Leadership; Clinical Professor Department: Management and Entrepreneurship Geoghegan, W., and Wanger, S. (2024). Beyond convenience: The disruptive high-quality, high-impact online MBA. Business Horizons, 67(3), 299-309.
Director, Customer Interface Laboratory Associate Chairperson, Marketing Department; E.W. Kelley Chair; Professor of Marketing Burke, R. R. and Leykin, A. (2021). Identifying the Drivers of Shopper Attention, Engagement, and Purchase. In Len Tiu Wright, Luiz Moutinho, Merlin Stone, and Richard Bagozzi (Eds.) The Routledge Companion to Marketing Research. London, UK: Routledge: Taylor & Francis Group.
Acting Co-Director, Kelley Data Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (DSAIL) Sungkyunkwan Professor of Information Systems; Department: Operations & Decision Technologies Wheeler, B. C. (2020). The CIO Agenda for a Decade of Converging Curves (Plus Cliffs and Clouds). EDUCAUSE Review.
IU James H. Rudy Professor
“The Virtual Advanced Business Technologies Department serves to connect faculty across all the business disciplines so we can work together to serve Kelley during this time of tremendous technological innovation.”
Brian WilliamsDepartment Chair, Fettig/Whirlpool Distinguished Faculty Fellow