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Golden West College
Region: Orange County
At a glance
Golden West College's AI Taskforce, working with the Center for Innovation and Learning, delivered role-based AI prompting workshops in April 2026 and hosted sessions on AI in mental health, signaling an active, cross-functional adoption effort. The library maintains student-facing guides (updated March 2026) that default to instructor permission for AI use and emphasize citation, while the 2022–23 Academic Integrity Workgroup provided sample syllabus language giving faculty discretion. The college also deployed Lightleap AI in 2025 to curb enrollment fraud with reported 96% effectiveness.
Updated Scan Findings
4 new 🆕· 10 source-verified findings from the updated web scanAI-Engaged People, Processes & Timelines · 3
- 🆕GWC AI Taskforce. Golden West College has an 'AI Taskforce' whose members co-presented the April 24, 2026 employee professional-learning session 'AI Prompting in Practice: Tools for Your Role,' indicating an active institutional group coordinating AI adoption. 2026 · high confidence — source
- 🆕AI Prompting in Practice workshop (April 2026). On Friday, April 24, 2026 (1-3pm, MS 347), the Center for Innovation and Learning offered 'AI Prompting in Practice: Tools for Your Role' for all GWC employees, presented by Erin Craig, Uyen Tran, and AI Taskforce members, focused on role-based prompt-building and improving AI results. 2026 · high confidence — source
- 🆕Promise & Peril: AI Mental Health Therapy session (March 2026). On March 10, 2026, GWC's professional learning program hosted 'Promise & Peril: AI Mental Health Therapy' (presenter John Luo, MD), examining the emerging use of AI in mental health services, its benefits, ethical considerations, and effectiveness. 2026 · high confidence — source
AI Policies · 2
- Student-facing AI integrity stance (instructor-permission default). The library's Student Guide to AI states that 'no Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) may be used unless the instructor allows it in their course policies,' directs students to verify each syllabus, and warns that submitting AI-generated work violates academic standards and that instructors have detection tools. 2026 · high confidence — source
- Academic Integrity Workgroup AI syllabus recommendations. The Academic Senate Academic Integrity Workgroup (Fall 2022-Spring 2023) recommended developing guidelines on student ChatGPT/AI use and provided sample syllabus AI statements (e.g., 'You MUST always cite when and where you have used AI'), with instructors deciding AI use per course; it also recommended AI-best-practices webinars/workshops. Spring 2023 · high confidence — source
AI Courses, Tools & Resources · 5
- 🆕Lightleap AI used to detect financial-aid/enrollment fraud. Ahead of Spring 2025, GWC deployed the AI tool Lightleap (by N2N Services) to detect fraudulent applications and enrollments; President Meridith Randall estimated it eliminated about 96% of fraud, dropping flagged fakes from 10-15 per class to 2-3. 2025 · high confidence — source
- Library 'Student Guide to AI' (updated March 2026). GWC's library maintains a 'Student Guide to AI' research guide covering generative AI definitions, ChatGPT prompting, fact-checking, plagiarism, and citation; it names tools including ChatGPT, Grammarly, Google Docs AI, Microsoft Copilot, and Perplexity. Last updated March 26, 2026; adapted from University of Arizona Libraries under CC BY 4.0. 2026 · high confidence — source
- AI listed as emerging tech in Software Development programs. The 2026-2027 catalog describes GWC's Software Development Certificate of Achievement (and AA) as applying skills to 'emerging technologies (artificial intelligence, urban simulation, augmented reality, and biotechnology process simulation).' 2026 · high confidence — source
- Continuing-ed 'AI for Students' online course (ed2go). GWC's continuing-education catalog (via ed2go) offers 'AI for Students: Ensuring Appropriate & Effective Use,' teaching nine popular AI tools and how AI can support content knowledge, writing, creativity, and progress monitoring. undated · medium confidence — source
- Continuing-ed 'AI for Teachers' online course (ed2go). GWC's continuing-education catalog (via ed2go, in partnership with Model Teaching) offers 'AI for Teachers: Increase Productivity & Improve Instruction,' covering how AI can be used to improve instruction. undated · medium confidence — source
Spring 2025 baseline
AI-Engaged People, Processes & Timelines
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Team/Lead: Golden West College/Academic Senate/Academic Integrity Workgroup, Pete Bouzar (Lead), Annamaria Crescimanno, Laura Duval, Matt Flesher, Sara Ghadami, Theresa Lavarini, Carla Martinez, Tim Vu/Library Faculty
- 2022-23 Academic Integrity Workgroup
- Purpose: To review the trends, frequency, and modality of academic dishonesty and make recommendations to address issues and concerns in the current educational environment.
- CIL (Center for Innovation and Learning) (Center for Innovation and Learning)
- Develop/offer faculty professional development activities through the CIL/Cornerstone
- Webinars/workshops on best practices for preventing A.D. in all modalities.
- Webinars/workshops to learn best practices of using turn-it–in.
- Webinars/workshops to learn best practices of using ChatGPT or similar A.I. websites.
- Webinars/workshops on integrating authentic assessments and equity-grading.
- Library faculty created guides
- Student Guide to AI
- “Remember to check with your instructor!
- Some instructors might not allow any use of ChatGPT and others might allow only limited use.”
- Guide to AI
- “Different courses will have different policies
- The default course policy is that no Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) may be used unless the instructor allows it in their course policies.*
- Check with your instructor for each course to find out the policy on using ChatGPT and similar tools.
- Submitting content from Generative AI is not your own work. Generative AI is becoming part of many different writing tools, including Grammarly, Google Docs, etc. Be very careful about how you use these tools.
- Many instructors have expertise and tools to inform them when students submit work using AI.
- *Check the syllabus for this information, if not found elsewhere.
AI Policies
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Team/Lead: Golden West College
- Not yet found. Appears to rely on student code of conduct, Academic Integrity
- 2022-23 Academic Integrity Workgroup
- “Suggestions
- Increase faculty knowledge and understanding of Academic Honesty Policy and Reporting
- Process.
- 1.4. Develop guidelines on how students may use ChatGPT or similar AI (Artificial Intelligence) websites. (See suggested statement below.)
- 1.5 Update Senate and Library websites as a resource for faculty and students.
- 1.6. Promote the use of resources and tools to check for academic dishonesty.
- 1.6.1. Academic Senate: https://www.goldenwestcollege.edu/senate/academic-integrityguide-faculty/index.html
- 1.6.2. Library: https://goldenwestcollege.libguides.com/academicdishonesty
- 1.6.3. Respondus Tools
- 1.6.4. Turn-it-In Tools
- 1.6.5. Canvas Logs
- 1.6.6. ChatGPT0 and other AI checker Tools”
- “The following can serve as a helpful template for syllabi statements or longer explanations regarding the use of AI in your courses. It is always up to each instructor to determine how and where students can use AI in their courses. It is important to state whether AI usage is allowed at all, and if so, it is helpful to provide guidelines such as these.
- Sample syllabus statement:
- While the use of Artificially Intelligent chatbots (such as ChatGPT, hereafter just “AI”) will be permitted to some degree in this course, the two most important things to remember are:
- You MUST always cite when and where you have used AI in your work.
- The work you submit, overall, must be your own, unique work. Here is a simple breakdown of what you can and cannot use AI for in this course:
- You CAN use AI to o give suggestions on how to fix your grammar or make your writing sound better;
- help you organize your work and give you suggestions on how to answer a question;
- help you create an outline or summary of your work;
- help you do research;
- help you figure out where to expand on your ideas or where your argument is weak;
- You CANNOT
- submit assignments that are primarily written by AI;
- use AI generated content in any way in the following assignments: ;
- submit AI generated summaries or outlines as your own;
- fail to properly cite where and how you used AI.
- Extended information that can be placed on Canvas, the syllabus, or elsewhere: AI is improving every day and will transform how a lot of work, especially writing and education, is done.
- Turning in an assignment that is primarily, or completely written by an AI, is not doing your own work, and in violation of academic integrity standards.
- Because of their very recent rise in popularity, I will be allowing the use of AI in this course according to the following guidelines, which have been generated using the help of ChatGPT.
- I asked it to generate guidelines for its use in a college course that includes critical thinking and edited what it gave me to help you use it while maintaining academic integrity and critical thinking:
- The use of AI generated content will be allowed on all assignments EXCEPT for . You should primarily use AI to help organize your thoughts and writing. You are highly discouraged from using them in any way for your discussion posts, however, as the primary point of the discussions is for you to get practice writing and thinking on your own.
- Any use of AI writers MUST be cited. Include which one you used, when you used it, where you have used it in your assignment, and any other relevant information. Failure to acknowledge when and where you have used them will result in a 0 on the assignment. The ability to resubmit the assignment is at the instructor’s discretion.
- Failure to meet the citation requirements in the assignments will result in a 0. This is to ensure that you are doing work on the assignment yourself, as AI cannot do this part of the assignment properly. The ability to resubmit the assignment is at the instructor’s discretion.
- AI writers are tools for expanding your understanding but should not be used as a replacement for your own critical thinking and analysis and thus should not be relied upon to do the bulk of an assignment.
- Do not trust AI and do not expect it to give you anything with real substance. You are responsible for your work, and you should double-check anything and everything it gives you.
- Use AI as a starting point for discussion and analysis. Rather than accepting its responses uncritically, use them as a jumping-off point for further exploration and critical thinking. Consider how the responses align with or challenge your existing beliefs and theories.
- Avoid relying solely on AI for answers to open-ended questions. While AI can provide useful insights, they may not be able to fully address the complexity of the issues. Use your own critical thinking skills and additional research to explore these issues in more depth.
- Finally, remember that AI writers are machine learning tools designed to simulate human conversation. They are not a substitute for human interaction or discussion. Always seek out opportunities to engage with your peers and instructors to deepen your understanding of important concepts.”
AI Courses, Tools & Resources
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Team/Lead: Golden West College
- Library faculty created guides
- Student Guide to AI
- “Remember to check with your instructor!
- Some instructors might not allow any use of ChatGPT and others might allow only limited use.”
- Guide to AI
- “Different courses will have different policies
- The default course policy is that no Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) may be used unless the instructor allows it in their course policies.*
- Check with your instructor for each course to find out the policy on using ChatGPT and similar tools.
Entities from the knowledge graph
college: Golden West Collegeorganization: Academic Integrity Workgrouporganization: Center for Innovation and Learningorganization: Libraryorganization: Golden West College Library Facultyperson: Pete Bouzarperson: Annamaria Crescimannoperson: Laura Duvalperson: Matt Flesherperson: Sara Ghadamiperson: Theresa Lavariniperson: Carla Martinezperson: Tim Vupolicy: Academic Honesty Policy
Links & artifacts
AI-Engaged People, Processes & Timelines · 2
Contacts at this college
| Name / Role | Phone | |
|---|---|---|
PB Pete Bouzar Lead | pbouzar@gwc.cccd.edu | |
AC Annamaria Crescimanno | acrescimanno@gwc.cccd.edu | |
LD Laura Duval | lduvall1@gwc.cccd.edu | (714) 716-4207 |
MF Matt Flesher | mflesher@gwc.cccd.edu | |
SG Sara Ghadami | ||
TL Theresa Lavarini | tlavarini@gwc.cccd.edu | (714) 895-8104 |
CM Carla Martinez | cmartinez@gwc.cccd.edu | (714) 895-8781 |
TV Tim Vu Library Faculty | (714) 895-8193 |