Dear Faculty and Staff,
With the 2026–27 academic year now underway, I wanted to take the opportunity to highlight several AI resources and initiatives available to the Penn community. Whether you are already using AI in your teaching, research, or other work, or are interested in exploring its potential, Penn provides several tools and resources to help you get started and determine what may best meet your needs.
Importantly, several of the free AI resources described below are also available to Penn students. Faculty may therefore want to become familiar with these tools when considering how AI may be incorporated into courses, assignments, or other academic activities.
PennChat is Penn’s free, secure AI portal that provides access to multiple large language models (LLMs), including models from OpenAI and Anthropic, through a single interface. PennChat is available at no cost to Penn faculty, staff, and students. For those interested in using generative AI, we encourage you to explore PennChat before purchasing a separate AI subscription, as its available models and capabilities may meet many common needs.
An important advantage of PennChat is its security and privacy protections. PennChat is approved for use with Low, Moderate, and most High Risk University data, with exceptions including Social Security numbers and credit card information, which should not be entered into the service.
One of the best ways to determine whether PennChat meets your needs is simply to try it. Ask the models questions related to the work you hope to accomplish with AI—writing and editing, summarizing, brainstorming, research assistance, technical questions, course development, document analysis, coding, or other tasks. You can even describe what you would like to accomplish and ask the model how it could help. Testing your actual use cases is a good way to determine whether the free service provides what you need or whether a more specialized or paid AI service is warranted.
PennChat is also expected to continue expanding during the fall semester, with planned enhancements including secure access to internet-based information as well as image-generation capabilities.
For more information about PennChat:
https://isc.upenn.edu/resources/pennchat-pilot-FAQs
Microsoft Copilot Chat is also available at no additional charge to eligible Penn faculty, staff, and students through Penn’s Microsoft 365 environment. When signed in with a Penn account, Copilot Chat includes Penn's enterprise data protections and, like PennChat, is approved for Low, Moderate, and most High Risk University data, except Social Security numbers and credit card information.
Copilot Chat provides web-search-enhanced generative AI and can create and work with text, images, and documents. Because it already includes web search, it can be particularly useful when a task requires current information from the internet.
It is important to make sure you are signed into Copilot with your Penn Microsoft account (PennKey@upenn.edu) to receive Penn's applicable protections. A personal Microsoft account does not provide the same University protections.
As with PennChat, we encourage you to try Copilot Chat with your intended use cases and see whether it meets your needs before considering a paid AI service. Faculty may also want to keep the availability of these tools to students in mind when considering AI-related coursework or activities.
The ISC AI Hub provides information about AI tools and services available at Penn, along with training opportunities, security and privacy guidance, and other resources supporting the safe and effective use of AI:
Penn’s Center for Excellence in Teaching, Learning & Innovation (CETLI) also provides resources specifically for instructors interested in generative AI for teaching and learning. Topics include assignment design, course policies, prompting, assessment strategies, privacy, and academic integrity:
https://cetli.upenn.edu/resources/generative-ai/
If PennChat and Copilot Chat do not meet a particular need, Penn also offers access to additional AI products and enhanced subscription plans that provide different or expanded capabilities.
Before requesting a paid AI service, we encourage you to first test your intended use cases with PennChat and Copilot Chat. For many common AI tasks, one or both of these free services may provide the functionality you need.
For AI tools that require a separate fee, an appropriate funding source will be required. For faculty, these costs will need to be covered by an available faculty funding source. For staff, paid AI tools or subscriptions will require departmental approval and an appropriate funding source.
Weitzman ITS can assist with reviewing the available options, understanding differences in functionality and data-security requirements, and determining the appropriate process for obtaining a paid AI tool when needed.
The Weitzman AI Committee is working on a number of School-specific AI initiatives for the 2026–27 academic year, including policies, guidance, resources, and other information to help faculty and staff understand and make effective and responsible use of AI within the School.
As part of this effort, we have launched the Weitzman AI SharePoint site, which will serve as a central location for School-specific AI information, guidance, resources, and updates:
The site will continue to be updated as new resources, guidance, policies, and information become available throughout the year. I encourage you to bookmark the site and check back periodically as our AI resources continue to develop.
AI technologies and Penn’s offerings continue to evolve quickly, so I encourage you to explore these resources and experiment with the tools available to determine how they may be useful in your teaching, research, and other work.
Please feel free to reach out to Weitzman ITS if you have questions, would like assistance exploring a particular AI tool or use case, or have suggestions for additional AI resources that would be helpful to the Weitzman community.
