Most people in higher ed hear “AI in admissions” and think: “Ah, so… another chatbot.”
In this episode of The VineDown, I sit down with CollegeVine’s own CTO, Chris Coffey, to pull back the curtain on what we’re actually building: autonomous AI agents that act more like teammates than tools with guardrails, reasoning, and real responsibility.
We get into:
If you’ve ever wanted a clear, honest explanation of how AI agents actually work in a high-stakes environment like education (and what’s coming next) this one’s for you.
00:00 – Cold open with Chris
02:05 – Meet Chris Coffey, CollegeVine CTO
03:00 – From AI recruiter “Sarah” to an agent platform
04:25 – Why deploying AI at scale is so damn hard
06:10 – Models leveled up. Our architecture had to, too.
08:00 – What “safe” actually means in an AI agent
11:45 – Agents, tools, and responsibilities (AI as a teammate)
14:30 – Long-running relationships: agents that support students for a year+
18:15 – How agents decide what’s urgent vs. what can wait
20:30 – Guardrails + reporting = less fear, more trust
21:55 – Inside Chris’s engineering philosophy
23:40 – Non-determinism: why agents are different from normal software
25:30 – A message to CIOs who want to “just build it themselves”
29:25 – The agent Little Chris wishes he had in college
31:30 – Unknown unknowns and the real value of student-facing agents
33:25 – Looking ahead: where agents and higher ed go next
33:55 – Emily’s closing + why this conversation matters
Listen to this special full episode of The VineDown wherever you get your podcasts!
.svg)
