The Ellis C. AI Chatbot helps facilitate communication by answering common questions and guiding users to the right resources. It has been trained on all articles available in VTAC and is designed to provide quick, accurate, and helpful answers to faculty VTAC-related questions. The chatbot is still in its early stages and continues to improve through regular updates and user feedback.
NOTE: Ellis C. on VTAC does NOT search external websites such as D2L, McGraw Hill, YuJa, etc. It does not have information about other departments within Lone Star College. It will search through VTAC articles only.
Accessing the Ellis C. AI Chatbot
At any time when navigating VTAC, you will see a [Speech Bubble] icon in the bottom right corner of your screen. Clicking this will open the Ellis C. AI Chatbot.
Using the Ellis C. AI Chatbot
- Upon opening the Ellis C. AI Chatbot, you will be greeted with an introductory message inviting you to ask questions such as "How do I create an assignment?" or "How can I build an accessible course?"
- The [Ask a question] text box will be available to type in any questions relating to articles in VTAC.
- After submitting a question, the chatbot will search through the VTAC database to find relevant information and guide you to the right resources.
- At any time, you can click the [Broom] icon to clear the conversation and start fresh. The chatbot remembers the entire conversation and uses that context to shape its responses, so clearing is helpful if you wish to reset that memory. You can also click the [Language Selector] icon to switch languages, or the [Emoji] icon for more flare.
Asking the Right Questions
The Ellis C. AI chatbot is still in its early stages, so it may occasionally have trouble understanding certain questions. Keep your questions clear and action-focused. Broad or open-ended questions such as "I have a site visit coming up and need to give visitors access to all my courses" or "When would my D2L course be available?" are outside the scope of the chatbot and will return an "Uh-Oh, I'm stumped!" response.
A good question to ask would be something like "How would I add professors to my class?" — it's clear and specific, which helps the chatbot understand and provide accurate information.
Providing Feedback to Ellis C. AI Chatbot
Giving feedback to Ellis C. helps improve the quality of its responses over time. When you let the chatbot know if an answer was helpful or not, it learns from that interaction and gets better at understanding and assisting users in the future. Your feedback matters!
Two Methods to Provide Feedback
- After Ellis C. responds to your question, you'll see a thumbs up and thumbs down option below the reply. Selecting one lets the chatbot know whether the response was helpful, which helps improve future answers.
- Clicking the [X] button at the top right of the chat window will bring up the end-of-conversation screen. From there, you can rate the chatbot from 1 star (very poor) to 5 stars (very good), leave constructive feedback in a text box, and view a transcript of the conversation by entering your email address.
VTAC Support
If repeated attempts to get an answer from Ellis C. are unsuccessful, we highly recommend using VTAC's search feature, located in the top right corner of the page. Try this before contacting your campus representatives or emailing VTAC support.
The VTAC support email is pinned at the bottom of the page for easy access. To find your campus representative, please navigate to https://vtac.lonestar.edu/help/campus-reps.
