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The MSU Library has many Artificial Intelligence (AI) initiatives and this is a place to document those initiatives for sharing and building awareness in the community.

AI Initiatives

    1. Responsible AI: Tools for values-driven AI in libraries and archives: Project website and News release. Viewfinder was developed by librarians at Montana State University, University of Montana, James Madison University, and Iowa State University, based on research conducted between 2022 and 2025, made possible in part by funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. 
    2. Modeling Transparency: Designing Model Cards for Responsible Generative AI Assignments- 2 MSU Library faculty were awarded Montana University System Teaching Scholar grants to work with 8 MSU faculty to develop discipline-specific AI teaching tools, which have been published and are freely available.
    3. Integrating AI Literacy into the Undergraduate Core Curricula- The MSU Library is the lead in participating in an Ithaka S+R cohort in 2025-2026 that, with 58 other cohorts across North America, is working to identify how libraries and other university units can weave AI literacy into their existing operations, leveraging programs or initiatives that center on information, digital, or metaliteracy. The College of Letters and Science administration, MSU Library faculty, and representatives of the CORE committee at MSU are part of this work.
    4. An MSU Library guide for students in generative AI- for students interested in responsible use of generative AI in academic work. It covers deciding if/when to use AI tools in academic work, prompt writing, citing AI, and ethical considerations of AI tools so students can engage thoughtfully
    5. AI Lab and AI Ambassadors- studio space and learning community to explore AI applications with advanced hardware and AI technologies.
    6. Leading OCLC Research Works in Progress sessionon building effective workflows for oral history projects - collaboration, structure, and innovation with/without AI.
    7. AI in Research workshop series (Fall 2025) - 4 separate workshops designed to empower researchers by integrating AI tools into their research workflows and applications. Each session will provide hands-on experience and valuable insights, from ethical considerations to practical application development.
    8. INBRE AI symposium at Montana Tech (October 2024) - MSU Library faculty were part of the agenda.
    9. MSU Library AI Task Force was formed with the following purpose and outcomes. The purpose of the Library Artificial Intelligence Task Force, AI-LIT, was to explore the potential of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for enhancing the library's services, operations, and contributions to the campus community. The outcomes of this task force were to provide:
      • An increased understanding of AI applications relevant to the library.
      • A set of recommendations for integrating AI into the library's services and operations.
      • An increased awareness and engagement with campus community around AI.
      • Actionable plans for piloting and implementing AI in the library.

AI Research and Open Experiments

  • Designing tools and frameworks like Viewfinder, a participatory toolkit to facilitate ethical reflection about responsible AI in libraries and archives from different stakeholder perspectives.
  • Using small language models (SLM) to reason across an MSU faculty list dataset to identify collaboration recommendations of faculty/researchers.
  • Understanding effective workflows for generative AI in oral history and archival projects.
  • Integrating MSU resources using the Model Context Protocol (MCP) to allow for searching of MSU materials in consumer LLMs like Claude, Gemini and ChatGPT.
  • Training and fine-tuning an LLM to summarize and describe MSU research findings in language levels accessible to Montana citizens. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-025-05386-z 
  • Applying an LLM and computer vision to create alternative text for accessible photos and images.
  • Context engineering (prompt design + context) to allow for responsible, equitable LLM interaction in consumer LLMs - establishing an AI/Human contract.
  • Leveraging LLMs and machine learning techniques to read historical newspapers and produce Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for archival and accessibility settings.