A note on who wrote this guide
This guide is published by Proctorly. We also make AcademicOS, a family of AI teaching tools that you’ll see in the task sections below. We’ve tried to describe each kind of tool fairly and we don’t rank anyone. When we mention other products, we keep to what is generally known and suggest you check the vendor’s current documentation. Please judge our tools by the same tests we recommend for everyone else’s.
What AI tools for teachers can and cannot do
Generative AI for educators is good at first drafts. Give it a syllabus, an outcome or a topic and within seconds it can write a lesson outline, a set of practice questions, a rubric or a paragraph of feedback. That takes care of the blank page.
What it can’t do is know your students, your program’s standards or whether its own draft is right. AI drafts can include errors, outdated material or examples that don’t suit your context. Whether a tool can write something matters less than who checks the draft, against what standard, before students see it.
The rule we follow, and the one AcademicOS is built on, is that AI drafts and faculty decide. AI never grades a student or makes an academic decision by itself.
AI tools by faculty task
Course design
What AI does. It turns a syllabus into a draft course structure, with modules, lessons, activities and question banks set out in a sensible order.
Where a person is needed. Someone has to decide what the course is for, check that each part serves a stated outcome and adjust the sequence for your students.
What to look for. Check whether the tool maps each drafted item to your course outcomes and a Bloom’s level, and whether you can see that mapping. There should also be an approval step before anything is published.
In AcademicOS. Studio drafts modules, lessons, activities and question banks from your syllabus. It maps every item to course outcomes and Bloom’s levels, and the draft goes through an approval workflow before anything is published.
Lesson planning
What AI does. It suggests a plan for a session, typically an opening, some activities, examples and a quick check for understanding.
Where a person is needed. You pick examples that suit your discipline and your students, and you decide what to drop when time runs short.
What to look for. A good plan is tied to the outcomes of that particular session instead of being a generic template, and you should be able to edit it in place.
In AcademicOS. The AI Teaching Copilot, an AI-powered teaching assistant for faculty, suggests lesson plans, activities and examples aligned to each session’s outcomes. Faculty accept, edit or discard every suggestion. The AI lesson plan generator page has more on this feature.
Rubrics and feedback
What AI does. It drafts rubric criteria and performance levels for an assignment, along with comments on student submissions.
Where a person is needed. Faculty set the standard and decide the grade, and they make sure feedback is accurate and fair to each student. A drafted comment is only a suggestion. It is never a mark.
What to look for. See whether rubric criteria link to course outcomes and whether feedback reaches students only after faculty accept or edit it. Find out if the tool ever assigns a grade by itself.
In AcademicOS. The Copilot drafts rubrics at a set difficulty for faculty to review, and those rubrics map to course and program outcomes. It also suggests feedback on submissions, which faculty accept, edit or discard. Nothing goes to a student without faculty approval. You can read more on the rubric generator page.
Question drafting
What AI does. It drafts practice and assessment questions on a topic at the difficulty you choose, often with answer keys.
Where a person is needed. Every question needs checking for accuracy, clarity, level and fairness, and a person decides which ones go into a graded test.
What to look for. You should be able to tag each question to a course outcome and a Bloom’s level. Look for a review or moderation step before any question appears in an exam.
In AcademicOS. The Copilot drafts questions at a set difficulty for faculty review. Studio drafts question banks as part of a course, mapped to outcomes and Bloom’s levels. For formal exams, the Proctorly Examination module adds AI-drafted questions that a moderator approves.
Student questions
What AI does. It answers routine student questions about deadlines, course rules and policies at any hour.
Where a person is needed. Anything that calls for a decision, such as an extension, a special case or a complaint, needs a person.
What to look for. Find out where the answers come from (the open internet or only your institution’s documents) and whether the tool shows its source. Ask what happens when a question needs a person.
In AcademicOS. AskOS, a chatbot for education, answers questions about courses, deadlines and policies using only the documents your institution provides. It shows the source for every answer and passes requests that need a person, like an extension, to the right member of staff.
The kinds of AI tools faculty use today
AI teaching tools and other AI tools for educators fall into four broad groups, and most faculty use more than one.
- General AI assistants. Chat tools such as ChatGPT, Google Gemini and Microsoft Copilot can draft almost any text from a prompt. They’re flexible, but they know nothing about your course unless you paste it in. Data and privacy terms vary between free, paid and institutional plans, so check the vendor’s current documentation.
- Teacher-focused tools. Products such as MagicSchool and Brisk give you ready-made templates for lesson plans, rubrics and feedback. Many started out for school teachers, so check the vendor’s current documentation for higher-education features and data terms.
- AI features inside an LMS. Some LMS platforms, Canvas, Moodle and Blackboard among them, have added AI features or are adding them. Because they sit close to your course data, it’s worth knowing that what each one does and how it handles data varies by version. Check the vendor’s current documentation.
- Institution platforms. These are adopted by the whole institution and connected to its programs, outcomes and documents. AcademicOS belongs here. You do more setup, and in return you get shared outcomes, approval workflows and institution control.
No single group suits every task. One faculty member brainstorming examples may need nothing more than a general assistant, while a department preparing for accreditation needs outcome mapping and a record of who approved what.
How to evaluate an AI tool for faculty
Put any of the AI tools for professors and faculty on your shortlist through these four tests. That includes ours.
Data use. Find out what happens to the syllabus, student work or questions you enter: whether they’re stored, for how long and where. Ask whether they train the vendor’s models and whether the institution can turn that off. The tool also has to fit the data-protection law that applies to you, such as India’s Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, or FERPA for student records in the United States. Get the answers in writing.
Faculty approval. Every AI draft should be marked as a draft, and nothing should reach students until a faculty member approves it. Ask whether the tool ever grades, ranks or makes a decision about a student by itself. For academic work, that answer should be no.
Outcome alignment. The tool should be able to see your course and program outcomes and tie lessons, questions and rubrics to them. If you work under NBA, NAAC or another outcome-based framework, outcome mapping decides whether you get a usable draft or one you have to rework.
Institution control. The institution should be able to decide who uses the tool, see what was approved and by whom, choose which documents a chatbot may answer from and remove access when someone leaves. Check, too, whether it can run beside your current LMS or forces a switch.
Here’s a short checklist to take into a vendor meeting:
- Where is our data stored, and is it used for training?
- Show us how a faculty member approves a draft.
- Show us an AI draft mapped to a course outcome.
- Show us the source behind a chatbot answer.
- Show us what an administrator can see and control.
Free AI tools for teachers: what to check before you use one
Free AI tools for teachers are a good way to try the idea out. Before you enter course material or student work, find out whether your inputs train the vendor’s models and whether the free plan’s data terms differ from the paid or institutional ones. Also check whether your institution has a policy on which tools may be used with student data. Don’t paste identifiable student work into any tool your institution hasn’t approved.
AcademicOS isn’t a free tool, and Proctorly doesn’t offer a free trial. If you’d like to see it, we’ll demo it on your own syllabus.
AI training for teachers: a short plan for a department
Tools only help when faculty know how to use them well. A practical AI training for teachers plan for a department could look like this:
- One session on what AI gets wrong, built around real examples from your own discipline.
- One session per task, where faculty draft a lesson plan, a rubric and a set of questions from a real course outcome and then review the drafts together.
- A shared rule sheet covering what may go into which tool, what has to be reviewed and who approves what students see.
- A review after one semester to look at what saved time, what added extra checking and what to stop doing.
Concentrate on review skills, because good use of AI for professors is mostly good reviewing. Faculty who can quickly spot a weak AI draft get the most out of any tool.
Is there a best AI tool for teachers?
Every day people search for the best AI tools for teachers, the best AI for teachers and the best AI tools for educators, and plenty of lists rank them. We don’t. For one thing, we make one of the tools, so our ranking wouldn’t be neutral. The right choice also depends on the task, the discipline, your institution’s data rules and whether you work under an outcome-based framework. For university teachers, a tool that maps drafts to your outcomes and keeps faculty approval in the workflow usually matters more than a longer list of templates.
Frequently asked questions
What are AI tools for teachers used for in colleges?
Faculty in colleges and universities mostly use AI tools for first drafts: course structures from a syllabus, lesson plans, practice and assessment questions, rubrics and feedback comments. Institutions also run AI chatbots that answer routine student questions about deadlines and policies. Either way, the AI produces a draft or a suggestion, and faculty review, edit and approve it before students see it.
Can AI grade student work?
AI can suggest feedback or draft comments on a submission, but grading is an academic decision and should stay with faculty. In AcademicOS, the AI Teaching Copilot suggests feedback that faculty accept, edit or discard, and nothing reaches students without approval. AI never grades a student or makes an academic decision by itself. Check this in any tool you evaluate before you adopt it.
Are free AI tools safe to use with student data?
That depends on the tool’s data terms and your institution’s policy. Some free plans store inputs or use them to improve models, and the terms may differ from paid or institutional plans. Read the tool’s current data policy and your institution’s rules first, and never paste identifiable student work into a tool your institution hasn’t approved.
How should a university choose AI tools for faculty?
Run four tests. For data use, ask where inputs are stored and whether they train the vendor’s models. For faculty approval, confirm every draft needs a person’s sign-off. Outcome alignment means drafts map to your course and program outcomes. Institution control covers who can use the tool, what administrators can see and whether it runs beside your current LMS. Ask every vendor to demonstrate all four.
Who publishes this guide?
Proctorly publishes this guide. Proctorly and AcademicOS are products of TatvaOne.AI, and AcademicOS includes Studio, the AI Teaching Copilot, AskOS and the AcademicOS LMS, all of which appear in the task sections. We don’t rank other tools. Where we mention them, we stick to generally known facts and suggest you check each vendor’s current documentation before deciding.