This week has emphasized that now is the time for reimagining what critical AI education might look like in the coming months and years, an education that eschews industry-captured AI literacy lessons for an expansive, interdisciplinary civics education with an emphasis on digital degrowth and data center resistance.

Whether students and faculty are actively using AI or not, it is having significant interpersonal, emotional effects on learning and trust in the classroom.

The downsides of generative AI are growing like wildfire

Students shared how they felt about AI usage—for students and adults alike

What’s really going on with campus-wide AI adoption is a mix of virtue signaling and panic purchasing. Universities aren’t paying for AI—they’re paying for the illusion of control. Institutions are buying into the idea that if they adopt AI at scale, they can manage how students use it, integrate it seamlessly into teaching and learning, and somehow future-proof education. But the reality is much messier.

AI’s ability to empower students to tailor their learning experience is a promising development in the quest to transform education. But we need to keep an eye on concerns that are more significant than the possibility of students over-relying on the technology.