mentorAI: The Platform for Campus Builders

Most campuses don’t need another closed chatbot. They need a platform for builders—a way for faculty and IT to craft purpose-built agents, plug them into campus data, and deploy them where learning actually happens. That’s what we’ve designed: Python and web SDKs on top of a unified API, deployable in your cloud or ours, so universities can ship agentic apps with real institutional context.

---

Why Campuses Are Moving This Way

In a recent conversation, one theme kept surfacing: control without complexity. Faculty want to shape how an assistant teaches; IT wants flexibility (no single-vendor lock-in) and deployment choice. And everyone wants assistants that understand students, courses, and policies—safely and transparently.

What You Can Build—Fast

• Course mentors with citations: Attach vetted readings, slides, and policies so answers point back to your materials. One mentor per course—or per student per course—keeps guidance aligned to scope.

• STEM assistants with Code Interpreter: For calculus and physics, code execution enables accurate plots, step-by-step derivations, and image generation of graphed equations—reducing hallucinations and boosting trust.

• Advising & operations agents: Structured prompts and tools handle FAQs, forms, appointment triage, and handoffs, with full conversation history for follow-up.

• Quality & accessibility coaching: Build mentors that nudge toward course-design standards and produce audit-friendly evidence as faculty iterate.

Builder Experience (DX) By Design

• Unified API: One abstraction layer over multiple LLMs and tools—swap models as pricing or performance changes without rewriting your app.

• Python SDK + Web SDK: Instantiate mentors, define tools, stream responses, log events, and embed anywhere your users already are.

• First-class retrieval: Add datasets from PDFs, slides, and pages; answers include citations so learners can verify and study correctly.

• Tool use & safety: Enable capabilities like Code Interpreter, diagram/image generation, and custom tools, wrapped with a campus-defined safety layer.

• Context awareness: Pass course and learner context (e.g., major, enrolled section, unit progression) so guidance is personalized and consistent.

• Observability: Each mentor includes analytics and transcript review so you can tune prompts, spot misconceptions, and demonstrate impact.

Built For Higher Ed Environments

• LMS-native embedding: Surface mentors via LTI for Canvas, Blackboard, Brightspace, and others. Keep permissions tight; decide whether content ingestion happens automatically (with IT approval) or via instructor-curated uploads.

• Deployment choice: Host in your cloud or use ours. Containers (e.g., Docker-based) make it straightforward for infrastructure teams.

• Agnostic to LLM vendors: Bring your preferred models and keys. Switch providers as costs or capabilities evolve—without changing your front end.

• Multi-tenant control: Segment departments, schools, or programs while maintaining centralized governance and shared infrastructure.

Analytics That Faculty Actually Use

Every mentor ships with a numbers-forward analytics console:

• Engagement over time to pace nudges and review sessions.

• Top questions and topics to target reteaching and improve materials.

• Representative transcripts to diagnose sticking points and refine pedagogy.

• Cohort insights and heatmaps to see when and where support is needed.

• Exportable evidence for assessment and accreditation workflows.

Governance, Not Guesswork

• Safety on top of model alignment: Constrain mentors to course-relevant domains and decline out-of-scope questions with helpful redirection.

• History & audit trails: Preserve context and decisions for accountability and instructor review.

• Role-based access: Let faculty build and iterate while IT manages org-level guardrails.

---

From Experimentation To Institutional Capability

What starts as “let’s try an assistant for this course” becomes an agentic application layer the university owns and extends. Because the SDKs and API are unified, teams reuse patterns: a tutor becomes an orientation mentor becomes an advising assistant—with shared telemetry, safety, and deployment practices. If you’re exploring how to empower your campus builders—faculty, instructional designers, and IT—to ship real agentic apps with institutional context, this is the path: SDKs for speed, a unified API for flexibility, and deployment options that keep you in control. Visit https://ibl.ai/contact if you’d like a short walkthrough: create a mentor, attach course materials, enable Code Interpreter for STEM use cases, embed in the LMS, and review analytics end-to-end!