Elizabethtown College Computer Science major Alexander Fox ’24 and Computer Engineering major Joshua Stoner ’25 worked on campus this summer to develop an cutting-edge resource that integrates the Artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot, Chat GPT,  and virtual reality to potentially be used in guiding prospective students through the admissions process by helping them learn more about Etown. Their work on campus this summer was part of the Summer Creative Arts and Research Program (SCARP).

Fox and Stone are working closely with Etown faculty mentor and Assistant Professor of Computer Science Jingwen Wang, developing two variations of the chatbot program, a web and virtual reality version. The web version is being designed to serve as a way for users to ask any question about the College, providing convenient access to information. The virtual reality version is an innovative way for prospective students to experience campus from the comfort of their home.

Title of Research
Etown-Chatbot: A College Chatbot System Leveraging Large Language Models and Customized Data

Student Researchers
Alexander Fox ’24 (Computer Science major)
Joshua Stoner ’25 (Computer Engineering major)

Faculty Mentor
Jingwen Wang, PhD, Assistant Professor of Computer Science

What are you researching?

Fox: We are making an Etown chatbot for both current and prospective students to interact with and learn anything they want about the College. There are two parts to this project, a web version, and a virtual reality version.

Stoner: We are working with AI-Language models to bring a responsive guide to potential or incoming students to Elizabethtown College.

Why did you choose this topic?

Fox: I wanted to learn more about the inner workings of AI chatbots, which were rapidly evolving and spreading across various domains.

What is the most interesting aspect of this research?

Fox: The most interesting part is seeing how the language model interprets the questions and uses our data to form a valuable response.

Stoner: The most interesting part of this project is working with the AI models in order to achieve results that fall within our expectations.

How has your faculty mentor helped you?

Fox: Dr. Wang has an abundance of knowledge in web development and can always offer valuable guidance or relevant resources.

Stoner: Dr. Wang has been a great resource to bounce off of for issues and roadblocks that I come across; she has a wealth of experience that makes her the perfect mentor for a project like this.

Hear from the faculty mentor – Jingwen Wang

“Working with Alex and Josh has been a rewarding experience,” Wang said. “They have demonstrated the ability to learn new technologies quickly and efficiently. Currently, we are developing an Etown chatbot system on the platform for both web users and Meta Oculus virtual reality (VR) users. We hope that this system will potentially contribute to Etown’s recruitment efforts by answering questions for prospective students both on the web and in VR.”