UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — The Nittany AI Alliance offers experiential learning opportunities for Penn State students to apply artificial intelligence (AI) to real-world challenges encountered by University, industry and nonprofit partners. One of those partners, the Penn State Office of Physical Plant (OPP), is working with Nittany AI to design, develop and test proof-of-concept solutions aimed at improving workflows for its staff and creating value for its customers.
The Advance program within the Nittany AI Alliance connects students with partners who define project challenges and provide mentorship. Students gain hands-on, career-ready experience, while partners benefit from fresh perspectives and emerging talent as they explore how AI can drive innovation.
Advance developed a strategic partnership with OPP by connecting with the unit’s thought leaders.
"Successful partnerships require deliberate strategy," said Andy Gatto, an education program specialist at Nittany AI. "By consulting directly with prospective partners, we identify and scope projects that are a fit for AI Advance. We then draw from the Nittany AI Challenge and our broader ecosystem to vet and align the absolute best student talent to execute them."
Ian Salada, director of strategic programs for OPP, helped define several project challenges for the students to work on.
“I put together a list of areas where artificial intelligence could enhance how we serve customers while helping our teams work more efficiently behind the scenes,” Salada said.
Advance is currently working with OPP on the following projects:
WorkPro
WorkPro is a proof-of-concept AI agent designed to support OPP’s Work Reception Center. The aim is to provide quick, automated answers from standard operating procedures (SOPs) when prompted with calls from across the University about facility problems.
“The tool functions through a chat-style interface — similar to Microsoft Copilot — that allows the customer service representative to enter questions about facility issues and receive SOP-based guidance,” Salada said. “The Advance team worked directly with staff in the center to ensure that the agent provided answers containing meaningful content in a format that supports dispatching needs.”
Drawing Vision
This proof-of-concept tool is designed to streamline the digitization and cataloging of University building drawings. Currently, many legacy documents exist only in paper form and must be manually reviewed, tagged and uploaded to a digital storage system.
Drawing Vision uses AI to analyze scanned drawings and automatically extract key metadata — descriptive information about each drawing, such as building name and type of drawing, such as electrical plan or floor plan — to quickly understand what each drawing is and where it belongs in storage.
The tool supports staff by significantly speeding up the process of digitizing and organizing records, helping reduce large backlogs of paper files.
Maximo Insights
Maximo Insights is a proof-of-concept, customer-facing AI agent designed to improve communication around work orders. It provides users with updates on work order status and scheduling using data from IBM Maximo, a computerized maintenance management system for logging issues, like a broken heater) scheduling repairs and monitoring the status and history of maintenance work.
The project addresses a key pain point: Many users either lack access to Maximo or don’t have sufficient permissions, forcing them to rely on phone calls or emails to obtain work status information. By making this information more accessible, the tool aims to streamline communication and improve transparency.
On these projects, Advance participants are partnering not only with OPP but also with vendors and third-party contractors, providing the students with exposure to the industry and potential career opportunities.
Advance and OPP meet biweekly to discuss the project’s progress and lay out next steps. Between meetings, students work toward objectives defined at the start of the semester.
“Advance operates on an agile framework — changes are expected and built into the process,” Gatto said. “Students make progress on portions of the project, then meet with the stakeholders to discuss that progress and adjust their approach as needed to keep their proof of concept aligned with client needs.”
According to Tim Arnold, facilities automation systems manager at OPP, the meetings are always carried out in a professional manner.
“We all have meetings on our calendars that we don’t look forward to, and this isn’t one of them,” Arnold said. “Everybody is fully engaged, and the students have so much excitement and passion for this work. It’s just a fantastic experience.”
There are several pathways each semester for students to find their way to Advance teams.
“Some students meet us through events like HackPSU or activities put on by our student society,” said Veronica Winter, an education program specialist at Nittany AI. “Others discover us by submitting or participating in the Nittany AI Challenge. Word of mouth is also a significant pipeline, as students often hear about the program from friends or former Advance participants.”
Interested students submit their resumes and, if selected, are invited to interview for semester-long internship opportunities.
“Students come in with foundational skills from their coursework and previous experiences and build on them through hands-on project work,” Winter said. “They receive onboarding to familiarize themselves with collaborative tools and workflows before diving into project work. From there, learning happens largely on the job, with partners providing guidance as students develop skills iteratively through project challenges.”
At the end of each semester, the Advance students meet with partners to review progress and plan next steps. Sometimes, that means continuing to build on the prototype; other times, it means shifting to a new idea or challenge.
“The projects Advance students are working on with partners like OPP tackle real challenges and opportunities to optimize workflows and provide staff with new capabilities and insights that save them time and replace tedious day-to-day tasks,” Gatto said.
Penn State is shaping the future of higher education in the age of artificial intelligence. Our focus is on human-centered, ethical AI innovation that delivers meaningful impacts for Penn State and the broader community. Through visionary planning, strategic partnerships, targeted hiring and strategic investments, we will equip every Penn State student, staff and faculty member with the AI-related knowledge, experience and confidence they need to succeed in the AI-powered future. Learn more at psu.edu/ai.