aiqbench analysis
This study evaluates the engineering trade-offs of deploying on-premises RAG-based AI tutors for business education, highlighting how model size and serving infrastructure impact classroom speed and factual fidelity. The authors conclude that an 8B parameter model currently offers the best balance between performance constraints and reliability, rejecting larger models that failed latency gates despite their theoretical capabilities. The work underscores that optimal AI implementation in institutional settings requires a joint decision involving model selection, evidence sourcing, and product design rather than relying on universally optimal parameters.
On-Premises Multi-Course RAG Tutoring for Business Education: Hardware-Software Trade-offs in a Campus AI Tutor
arXiv:2610.02510v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Campus AI tutors based on retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) must ground answers in assigned course materials while keeping textbooks and student dialogue on institutional infrastructure. We present CourseChat, an on-premises, multi-course RAG tutor for undergraduate business education, deployed behind a campus web gateway and intended for use embedded in Moodle. Six isolated course offerings, each keyed by its own course reference number (CRN), share twin-edge AI hosts running a FastAPI service, a local vector database, and a local large language model (LLM) served by Ollama. We report two generation-model bake-off rounds, a separate fixed-evidence source-fidelity comparison, and conversation and quiz audits. Several larger models failed the classroom speed gate, but a 12B model and a 7B alternative passed. A separate mixture-of-experts candidate improved some corrections while introducing new factual and continuity errors. We therefore retain the 8B production model pending a demonstrated overall improvement, rather than claiming that 8B is universally optimal. Software changes improved follow-up topic resolution while preserving course scope; 435 prebuilt questions across 65 modules decouple practice from live generation. The results support treating model choice, evidence selection, serving compatibility, and product design as a joint engineering decision. They do not establish learning gains: faculty ratings, peak-load capacity, and complete public-gateway acceptance remain separate evaluation needs.
Abstract:Campus AI tutors based on retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) must ground answers in assigned course materials while keeping textbooks and student dialogue on institutional infrastructure. We present CourseChat, an on-premises, multi-course RAG tutor for undergraduate business education, deployed behind a campus web gateway and intended for use embedded in Moodle. Six isolated course offerings, each keyed by its own course reference number (CRN), share twin-edge AI hosts running a FastAPI service, a local vector database, and a local large language model (LLM) served by Ollama. We report two generation-model bake-off rounds, a separate fixed-evidence source-fidelity comparison, and conversation and quiz audits. Several larger models failed the classroom speed gate, but a 12B model and a 7B alternative passed. A separate mixture-of-experts candidate improved some corrections while introducing new factual and continuity errors. We therefore retain the 8B production model pending a demonstrated overall improvement, rather than claiming that 8B is universally optimal. Software changes improved follow-up topic resolution while preserving course scope; 435 prebuilt questions across 65 modules decouple practice from live generation. The results support treating model choice, evidence selection, serving compatibility, and product design as a joint engineering decision. They do not establish learning gains: faculty ratings, peak-load capacity, and complete public-gateway acceptance remain separate evaluation needs.
Artificial Intelligence (cs.AI); Information Retrieval (cs.IR)
arXiv:2610.02510 [cs.AI]
(or arXiv:2610.02510v1 [cs.AI] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2610.02510 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration)
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Full text under the publisher's open licence · 305 words
