AI @ LSU: Students Shine Showcasing Tech Innovation

How many LSU students get to take their final exam in Tiger Stadium?

Exactly 25 juniors and seniors enrolled in LSU Engineering’s capstone-style computer science course, who presented artificial intelligence applications to real-world business problems on Monday night to a standing-room only crowd at Stadium Club South.

Surrounded by family, friends, and faculty and industry supporters, the undergrads presented their work at the AI Showcase: Applications in Construction, Healthcare, and Energy. The event was a test wrapped in a party. Dressed in their business best, students presented their final projects onstage, explaining the tech solutions they created for problems submitted by four Louisiana businesses—BASF, Entergy, Our Lady of the Lake, and Performance Contractors, Inc.

Students snapped selfies, grazed an elegant buffet, and gathered in groups to applaud the giant AI Showcase sign that lit up the stadium scoreboard.

They also got kudos from College of Engineering Dean Vicki Colvin and College of Business Dean Russell Crook and advice from LSU’s new Executive Vice President James Dalton, who told them that “collaborating as a team, being resistant to failure and doing something new” is the key to career success. At the end of the night, LSU junior Valerio Luftig was beaming.

“Every other class is living in theory,” Luftig said.  “In this class, I got to live in the real world, with real AI challenges faced in real businesses. Great experience!”

The showcase is an example of LSU's growing regional dominance in AI education and research, powered by the college and its Division of Computer Science and Engineering.

College leaders this fall applied to the LSU Board of Supervisors to offer a bachelor's degree in AI. If approved by LSU, state officials, and regional regulators, the AI degree would be offered as early as spring 2027. It would be Louisiana's first AI undergraduate degree, and one of only three in the Southeastern Conference.

College research in the area is also growing fast. 

In July of 2024, LSU Engineering's Cyber AI team, consisting of James Ghawaly and Golden G. Richard III, was awarded federal funding to support a $25 million consortium, with LSU faculty supporting U.S. nuclear security missions and educating cyber and data science professionals with AI skill sets so they can pursue careers in the Department of Energy’s national labs. BASF, the world's largest chemical producer with a major footprint in Louisiana, is working with LSU engineers to use AI to better understand and predict their production workflows. Faculty are filing patents and launching companies based on AI technologies they've developed, including the startup FarmSmart, an AI-powered crop management tool, which spun out of Computer Science 4700 | Honors 3025, the course that sponsors the AI Showcase.

LSU is also pioneering the use of AI in its academic operations, launching MikeGPT earlier this year. The app, created last summer by Ghawaly and three computer science students, helps students and faculty find, store, and search course information. The AI assistant operates in many languages and serves as a campus-based alternative to ChatGPT.

The course has now graduated five classes, and instructors say its has made an impact. Major companies including Google, Microsoft, SpaceX, Oracle, Amazon, and Epic Systems, have all hired course graduates. Others have snagged high-paying internships, while one student published a major paper. Then there’s the FarmSmart startup.

"The college and the university are making big investments in AI because this technology is driving so much innovation and it’s a driver for student success."

LSU College of Engineering Dean Vicki Colvin

“The college and the university are making big investments in AI because this technology is driving so much innovation and it’s a driver for student success,” said LSU Engineering Dean Vicki Colvin. “Students with these AI skills, and the leadership and soft skills they get from the course, make them highly prized by business.”

Monday’s showcase served as a graduation of sorts for students enrolled in the highly selective course. Students must first apply to the class. If they’re accepted, they form teams with each team led by a student enrolled in the E.J. Ourso School of Business or the Roger Hadfield Ogden Honors College, who manages a team of College of Engineering computer science students. Together, they solve a workplace challenge submitted by an industry sponsor, who not only pays a $25,000 fee and submits a real-world problem to solve, but sends one or more employees to work with student teams weekly.

---

---

Not only is the course a unique academic-industry partnership, it’s also a unique interdisciplinary effort. The course is taught by computer scientist and assistant professor, Ghawaly; entrepreneur and adjunct instructor, Henry Hays; and inventor and engineer, the LSU College of Engineering Dean Vicki Colvin.

All semester, students work on sponsors’ business challenges and get hands-on experience using large language models, or LLMs, sophisticated AI systems that can understand, generate, and predict human language. Students work in Python, the computer programming language that dominates AI, and use a variety of AI tools, apps, and agents. For their final exam, students present their solution as a team and provide an overview of the problem and solution, along with details like cost to implement, return on investment, and future work if the team had more money and time.

---

---

Along with the presentations, Monday’s showcase featured an all-star panel of Louisiana executives—Art Favre, founder and owner of Performance Contractors Inc., Roy O. Martin III, chairman and CEO of RoyOMartin, and Steve Webb, president and CEO of Neighbors Federal Credit Union.

Each spoke about the opportunities and improvements that AI technologies have brought to their businesses. Students said the course itself was equivalent to an internship due to the high concentration of industry exposure, hard work, and high expectations.

“You’re learning to code in the class and taking on real problems,” said Skyler Dowling, a senior computer science major. “The homework was unbelievably hard, but you actually learn something. This course was fantastic and we need more of it. It’s great to see LSU stepping up their game in AI and making this investment.”

 

Like the College of Engineering on Facebook or follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram, Bluesky, and X.