AI for the Workforce

Registration Now Open 

AI for the Workforce: Beyond Just the Basics

Lives Sessions November 12, 2026, and November 19, 2026

Required office hours. See dates below.

Registration Fee: $799 per person. Payment by credit card is required at the time of registration.

Click the button below to register. You will be prompted to create an account and complete payment by credit card to finalize your registration.

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Please note: You have one hour to complete registration and submit payment. Incomplete registrations will be automatically deleted after one hour.

Questions related to registration or employers registering three or more people, contact n.pratt@csuohio.edu

Instructor Led | Synchronous Online Classes | Office Hours Required

1. Course Description

AI for the Workforce: Beyond Just the Basics is a live, instructor-led program for working professionals who want to move past casual experimentation with generative AI and start using it reliably in their actual work. Across two interactive sessions and three coaching office hours, participants progress from directing AI tools with structured prompting to using the advanced capabilities that separate occasional users from skilled practitioners: persistent project workspaces, AI-powered research and data analysis, and custom AI assistants built for their own recurring work.

The course is practical by design. Participants work with AI tools during every session, practice on their own tasks between sessions, and bring that work back to office hours for individual coaching. They leave with a personal prompt library, a working project workspace, and a custom AI assistant built for a real task in their role. Instruction is tool-agnostic and applies to ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Claude, Gemini, and similar platforms.

The course is intended for professionals and managers across industries. No technical background is required.

2. Format, Schedule, and Time Commitment

All instruction is live and virtual, delivered via Zoom, with CSU's Blackboard Ultra serving as the hub for materials, recordings, and communications.

Learner time commitment

Approximately 12 hours over four weeks: 5 hours of live instruction, 3 to 4.5 hours of office hours, and roughly 3 hours of independent practice applying techniques to participants' own work between sessions.

3. Required Materials

There are no textbooks or purchased materials. Participants need:

• Required: A paid individual plan on at least one major AI platform, such as ChatGPT Plus, Claude Pro, Gemini Pro, or a Microsoft 365 Copilot license (typically $20 to $30 per month), or an employer-provided account on one of these platforms.
• A computer with a reliable internet connection, camera, and microphone for live participation.

All course materials are provided in Blackboard Ultra, including a prompt starter kit, quick reference guides for the CRAFT prompting framework, a prompting ebook, an introductory guide to how large language models work, an assistant design template, and recordings of each live session.

4. Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:

• Explain in plain terms how generative AI and large language models work, and why that shapes how they should be used.
• Write structured prompts using the CRAFT framework that produce consistent, high-quality outputs.
• Verify AI outputs, identify errors and hallucinations, and build review habits appropriate to professional work.
• Use AI responsibly, including data safety, recognizing limitations, and judging when not to use AI.
• Personalize AI tools with custom instructions and memory so outputs consistently match their role and preferences.
• Apply everyday AI capabilities, including citation-grounded search, voice interaction, data analysis on uploaded files, and image generation, to speed routine work.
• Set up a persistent project workspace that grounds AI in their own files and keeps context across days and weeks.
• Conduct deep, multi-source research with AI, structure requests by goal, scope, and format, and validate results against cited sources.
• Design and build a custom AI assistant for a recurring task in their role, and understand skills as the emerging cross-platform standard for packaging reusable expertise.

Session 1: Working with AI effectively

The full foundation for confident daily use. The session opens with how generative AI actually works, prediction, tokens, and context windows, and what that means for getting good results, paired with responsible use: data safety, guardrails, and hallucination awareness. The core of the session is structured prompting with the CRAFT framework, practiced live with iteration and refinement on real professional tasks. Participants then personalize their AI with custom instructions and memory, and put the everyday capabilities to work: citation-grounded search, voice for dictation and scenario practice, plain-language data analysis on uploaded files, and image generation. Each participant leaves with at least three documented use cases from their own role.

Session 2: AI power tools for real work

Three capabilities that move participants beyond basic chat use. First, project workspaces: persistent workspaces grounded in the participant's own files (Projects in ChatGPT and Claude, Notebooks in Gemini and Copilot), and when to use a workspace versus a quick chat. Second, AI-powered research and analysis: deep, multi-source research with cited sources, structured verification habits, and data analysis on the participant's own files. Third, reusable AI capabilities: building a custom assistant (a custom GPT, Gem, or agent) with a clear mission, instructions, knowledge sources, and prompt starters, plus an introduction to skills, the open standard for packaging expertise across platforms. The session concludes with the capstone brief.

5. Projects and Artifacts

Rather than graded assignments, participants produce practical work products drawn from their own jobs:

• Personal prompt library. A set of tested, reusable prompts tailored to the participant's recurring tasks.
• Role-specific use cases. At least three documented opportunities where AI improves the participant's work, identified in Session 1 and refined through practice.
• Grounded project workspace. A working project workspace built around a real project from the participant's role, with their own reference files loaded.
• Verified research brief. A short AI-assisted research output with sources checked and validated by the participant.
• Capstone: a custom AI assistant. A working custom assistant built for a recurring task in the participant's role, tested and refined with instructor coaching during office hours.

6. Office Hours

Office hours are where most of the learning takes hold. After each session, participants return to their own work, attempt real tasks, and come back with results and questions. Office hours are interactive and small-group: participants share their screens, walk through prompts and outputs, and receive direct coaching on improving results and choosing where to apply AI next.

Office Hour 1 follows Session 1 and focuses on applying prompting fundamentals to participants' first use cases. Office Hours 2 and 3 follow Session 2 and focus on the capstone: reviewing and troubleshooting participants' project workspaces and custom assistants, refining instructions and knowledge sources, and validating outputs before participants rely on them in real work. Spacing the office hours over three weeks gives participants time to practice between each one.

7. Teaching Philosophy

The course follows a Learn, Apply, Reinforce cycle, refined through training more than 5,000 professionals across financial services, nonprofits, cultural institutions, higher education, and professional services.

• Learn. Live, instructor-led sessions with demonstrations and hands-on exercises. Participants use AI tools during class rather than watching.
• Apply. Between sessions, participants take new skills into their own work, encountering real problems and developing real questions.
• Reinforce. Office hours provide coaching on the work participants attempted, which is where lasting behavior change happens.

Classroom instruction alone rarely changes how people work. Practice on real tasks, with expert support to course-correct, does. The curriculum is also updated continuously as AI tools evolve, so participants learn the tools as they exist today.

8. Learner Support

• All materials, session recordings, and announcements are available in Blackboard Ultra throughout the course.
• Three office hours provide direct, individual coaching on participants' own work.
• Participants can contact the instructor with course questions and can expect a response within two business days.
• Sessions include live captioning through Zoom, and materials are provided in accessible digital formats.
• Registration, payment, and general CSU questions are handled by the Division of Lifelong Learning and Workforce Development.

9. Completion Requirements

To earn the CSU digital badge and certificate, participants must attend and actively participate in both live sessions and at least two of the three office hours. The instructor documents attendance and participation and reports completion status to CSU, which determines eligibility and issues credentials.

10. Instructors

Lead instructor: Gerardo Kerik, Principal, AI Strategy and Business Transformation, WSI Digital Boost. 

Instructor Bio

Gerardo Kerik is Principal of AI Strategy and Business Transformation at WSI, where he designs and delivers practical AI training for working professionals. He has trained more than 5,000 people across financial services, nonprofits, higher education, cultural institutions, and professional services, helping them turn powerful AI tools into skills they can use in their real work. Before focusing on AI, he spent more than two decades in Fortune 100 marketing leadership at Disney, Turner, and Diageo across global markets. He holds an MBA from London Business School and is an Industrial and Systems Engineer.