Student Support Transformed: How The University of Auckland's AI Assistant Handles 67,000 Conversations with Governance-First Design

Universities today face rising digital expectations as students demand personalised, always‑on support. At the University of Auckland, our Student Assistant now handles more conversations than our contact centre—delivering comparable satisfaction levels and more than paying for itself. In this session, I’ll share the journey we took to get there: from the early groundwork and architecture behind our Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) Assistant, to the integration of technical AI governance and TRiSM tooling that gave our leadership confidence we were actively managing reputational and compliance risks. I’ll also walk through the business case, the payback story, and how we used service metrics to support adoption and continuous improvement. With over 67,000 conversations annually and strong uptake among international students, especially in admissions, we’ve gained rich insights into where generative AI adds real value—and where care is needed.