The Future of Education

The emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI), specifically AI generative tools, has spread fear across the education sector over the past months and year. Institutions of Higher Education share one primary concern that AI adoption would challenge the existence of valuable academic paradigms: assessment, course design, research activities, and more, which would undermine teaching and learning.

However, focusing only on the challenges  distracts us in Higher Education from the many benefits AI can bring. Instead of ignoring and neglecting AI and percieving it as evil, educators should take time to explore and experiment with this new technology, therefore helping students to do the same thing. Most importantly, a smooth AI adoption process requires tremendous support and responsibilities from institutional leaders (both administration and faculty). These responsibilities entail changing once perspective on AI.

According to many recent polls, Adopting and Adapting to Generative AI in Higher has been identified by most respondents as revealing the AI tasks that educators take on can range from developing policies and guidelines for appropriate AI use, creating institution-wide strategies, consulting faculties on AI applications, to producing training and resources for faculty, staff, and leadership. There are also implications for the institutional culture and establishing ethical guidelines for all.

To address these responsibilities, institutions would require access to many support sources, including peer-based examples on the adoption processes and policies, up-to-date knowledge of AI, communities of practices, how to build inter-departmental collaboration and advocacy for the values guiding the use of AI.

In this presentation, the author will highlight the challenges and opportunities of AI, to help faculties in creating policies and strategies surrounding AI adoption. The basic purpose of this paper is to communicate to those of us in Higher Education that AI is here to stay and that as we have done in the past we must adapt and utilize it for good...positive purposes in Education.

Keywords:  AI, Higher Education, Opportunities, Challenges, Adapting