University of Guelph

Always check the course syllabus or check with your instructor

As an instructor, you determine whether and how AI is incorporated

Acceptable use of AI should be determined by the course instructor

Students are responsible for appropriately referencing

Always check the course syllabus or check with your instructor

Privacy and Data security : Student work that can identify, or reasonably be linked to, an individual student is personal information under Ontario's Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA) and must be handled accordingly.  Information Security's Artificial Intelligence Acceptable Use Guideline  (May 2026) notes that identifiable student work is confidential information and cannot be shared in public AI tools (e.g. ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini), whether the account is free or a paid personal one. Prompts in those tools have left the University's custody and may train someone's next model. If a teaching/assessment task needs an external tool, you should strip the prompt of any identifying information, ask Information Security to review the tool (if not previously reviewed;  infosec@uoguelph.ca ), or build the task so students enter their own work themselves (while offering them an opt-out).

Microsoft Copilot, signed in with your University single sign-on, can be used for student information. Authenticated Copilot runs inside the University's Microsoft environment with enterprise data protection ( Copilot: Get Started ). Faculty and staff use various tools for other purposes, such as drafting, brainstorming, summarizing public material, and that is fine; but do not share student information with third-party tools. For more information, please review the  Information Security guidelines for differentiation among data types .

Microsoft Copilot, signed in with your University single sign-on, can be used for student information. Authenticated Copilot runs inside the University's Microsoft environment with enterprise data protection ( Copilot: Get Started ). Faculty and staff use various tools for other purposes, such as drafting, brainstorming, summarizing public material, and that is fine; but do not share student information with third-party tools. For more information, please review the  Information Security guidelines for differentiation among data types .