For Academic Advisors ·
What you'll accomplish
By the end of this guide, you'll have Otter.ai set up on your phone or computer to automatically transcribe and summarize your in-person and virtual advising appointments. Instead of writing notes from memory after each session, you'll have an AI-generated summary to review, edit lightly, and paste into Navigate — in about 2 minutes instead of 10–15.
What you'll need
What you should see: You'll land on the Otter home screen showing "My Conversations" — currently empty. No errors. Troubleshooting: If you're blocked from creating an account on a work device, use a personal device — Otter is a personal tool you own, not an institutional system.
Before recording any student, you need their consent. This is both ethically required and good practice under FERPA.
Option A — Verbal consent at the start of each appointment: "I use a transcription app to help me take notes so I can be fully present in our conversation. Is that okay with you? The transcript is private and just used for my advising records."
Option B — Add a consent line to your appointment confirmation email: "I use Otter.ai to transcribe our conversation to help me keep accurate advising notes. If you prefer I don't use it, just let me know and I'll take notes manually instead."
Most students say yes. If any student says no, simply don't record that session — your judgment about the relationship matters more than the tool.
What you should see: The recording screen shows a waveform and real-time transcription text appearing as words are spoken.
(After appointment, in Navigate notes field — paste Otter summary and add context:)
[Paste Otter AI Summary here]
Additional context: [Any notes on tone, concerns, or sensitive context not appropriate for transcript]
Referrals made: [List any services the student was referred to]
Follow-up scheduled: [Yes/No, date if applicable]