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The Impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) on University Education

A recent study claimed that ChatGPT, the popular AI chatbot, completed the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) undergraduate curriculum in mathematics, computer science, and electrical engineering with 100-percent accuracy. While the study is a preprint, meaning that it hadn’t yet passed through peer review it has 15 authors, including several MIT professors. 

Recent progresses in AI technology have raised several important questions for university educators. Will AI reduce students’ creativity? With access to vast amounts of information, students can use AI to solve their homework and assignments, rather than using their own creativity and knowledge to solve such problems. Does AI technology impact all fields of education equally? Will AI technology take away the control of education from universities and give control to major technology companies? Can AI effectively be used to improve higher education? While the answers to these and many other questions are still being debated, several conclusions can already be made. 

AI technology will greatly impact higher education and we must accept that the traditional models of higher education must change dramatically. Technology will continue to advance and unless students and faculty adapt, they will be eliminated from the modern education system. 

A major potential impact of AI is to change the education system from a teaching-centered to a learning-centered system. In this system students will have a much more active role in a class. The faculty will not play the only active role in a class, but the main participation will come from students. The impact is not limited to the role of the faculty. An AI based education system can move towards individualized education. It is understood that the learning ability of students can be very different. AI allows faculty to recognize these differences and provide individualized models of learning to different students and actively monitor their progress. 

While AI technology can be used in all fields, the level of its application can be different. For example, in areas such as chemistry and biology and mechanical engineering where visual modeling is important AI can have a lot of applications. In contrast in fields such as theoretical mathematics, the application may be less. 

The application of AI tools such as ChatGPT in some of the areas of arts or humanities such as language and literature can be significant. In general, the impact in theoretical fields may be more limited. 

A properly designed AI based education actually may help advance students’ creativity. For example, in the current educational system students are asked to memorize a lot of information. Using AI, the system instead can focus more on analysis and research of complex problems. Obviously, the types of questions must change from simple questions to those requiring research and analysis. Questions which can be answered through an Internet search are not typically complex problems faced in industry and society anyway.  

Students today are very technology savvy, mastering any new technology very quickly. Continuous training for faculty to keep up with students in this regard is essential. Today we are educating students for jobs that do not yet exist. The same conditions apply to AI based education. Many faculty were educated when such technologies did not exist. This gap between what faculty learned and what they need to apply today must be addressed with sustained continuing education. Utilizing teams of faculty with different expertise is a way of addressing this issue.

Addressing a complex problem such as this requires educational authorities to develop a road map, utilizing faculty administrators and experts who believe in the need for change to bring this new technology into the educational system. 

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