Universities nationwide are experiencing an increase in student accommodations requests. The University of Iowa had 257 requests in 2008. By 2024, requests for student accommodations had risen to 826.
“The class notes accommodation ensures that students have notes comparable to what they would take if their disability did not interfere with notetaking,” explains Mike Venzon, director of Student Disability Services. “Creating class notes poses a unique challenge, depending on the course. Is it recorded? Does the instructor use PowerPoints or other digital displays?”
Venzon, who continually searches for opportunities to streamline this process and others, and Ross Miller, a lead application developer in Information Technology Services who wanted to leverage AI to help students, were connected by Tanya Uden-Holman, associate provost for undergraduate education.
They along with the ITS Office of Teaching, Learning, and Technology set out to develop a tool that integrated with the university course-management system, ICON, and was simple to use. They succeeded with the creation of Note Depot. The platform has two distinct features: LectureAI, which uses AI to generate notes from UI Capture transcripts, and the Note Taking Exchange that facilitates note sharing between students.
With Note Depot, instructors can review notes before they’re published, control when notes become available, and release notes to an entire class or only to students with a class notes accommodation.
Existing systems and new technology
LectureAI leverages artificial intelligence to generate notes from recorded UICapture (Panopto) sessions. Built using OpenAI, the creators of ChatGPT, the university’s license prevents the AI model from using university information to train it.
It automatically deletes common verbal pauses, like “um,” and the developers provide class context to mitigate concerns with transcription errors that can occur with unique phrases and words.
Susan Wagner Cook, associate professor of psychological and brain sciences, used LetureAI in her Introduction to Developmental Science course with 233 students enrolled.
“I’ve always recorded my lectures, and it seemed like a low-stakes way to incorporate technology that could make notes more readily available,” Cook says. “It was a great experience. You turn it on, and it just works in the background with a few minor tweaks. I did review the notes and would occasionally eliminate extraneous announcements.”
LectureAI even offers two formats, so students can select what best supports their learning. They can view a bulleted list of key points or an in-depth outline with headings and subheadings.
“The notes were a good representation of the material presented in lectures, and they were created in a way that might be especially helpful for students with less background knowledge,” Cook says.
Facilitating note exchanges with ease
Confidentiality is essential when meeting student accommodations, making many existing collaboration tools unwieldy for sharing notes between student notetakers and students with accommodations.
“Instructors reported that’d they have volunteer notetakers, but it could be a time consuming, complex process for them to manage the content exchange while maintaining anonymity,” Venzon says.
The Note Taking Exchange allows instructor-designated students to contribute and share notes via ICON, removing the need for instructors to facilitate the process.
“It’s saving instructors time, and it’s creating a positive user experience for students as they receive and access class notes the same way each time,” Miller says.
A noticeable impact
“We’re excited for this solution because it uses existing systems to deliver notes quickly and easily,” Venzon says. “And it’s built by University of Iowa Information Technology Services, so we can control the functionality and engage in continuous improvement.”
Their hard work is paying off. A pilot included 17 courses with 1,663 students, which generated 1,228 AI notes that helped meet 29 class notes accommodations. Launched campus-wide in fall 2025, there were 92 courses with 6,041 students using Note Depot. It generated 4,998 AI notes and aided in the exchange of 191 notes by student notetakers, helping to meet 314 student accommodation.
“I was surprised by how quickly the uptick in usage occurred,” Miller says. “But it’s been great to create a platform that meets a campus need, supports students, and reduces the burden on instructors.”
They were even recognized with an Improving Our Workplace Award (I.O.W.A.) in fall 2025.