As generative AI becomes increasingly integrated into higher education, understanding how students engage with these technologies is essential for responsible adoption. This study evaluates the Educational AI Hub, an AI-powered learning framework, implemented in undergraduate civil and environmental engineering courses at a large R1 public university. Using a mixed-methods design combining pre- and post-surveys, system usage logs, and qualitative analysis of students’ AI interactions, the research examines perceptions of trust, ethics, usability, and learning outcomes. Findings show that students valued the AI assistant for its accessibility and comfort, with nearly half reporting greater ease using it than seeking help from instructors or teaching assistants. The tool was most helpful for completing homework and understanding concepts, though views on its instructional quality were mixed.
Sunday, February 8, 2026
Artificial Intelligence panel demonstrates breadth of teaching, research, and industry collaboration across the Universities of Wisconsin - University of Wisconsin
The Universities of Wisconsin underscored their growing leadership in artificial intelligence (AI) innovation today as representatives from all 13 public universities convened for a panel discussion before the Board of Regents. The conversation highlighted the universities’ shared commitment to shaping the future of AI in education, research, and workforce development. “As AI reshapes our world, the Universities of Wisconsin are not standing on the sidelines. We are helping define what responsible and innovative use of AI looks like for higher education,” said Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman. “This panel today demonstrated how the Universities of Wisconsin are embracing AI in strategic, collaborative, and responsible ways.”
What generative AI reveals about assessment reform in higher educatio - Higher Education Policy Institute
Assessment is fast becoming a central focus in the higher education debate as we move into an era of generative AI, but too often institutions are responding through compliance and risk-management actions rather than fundamental pedagogical reform. Tightened regulations, expanded scrutiny and mechanistic controls may reassure quality assurance systems, but they run the risk of diluting genuine transformation and placing unsustainable pressure on staff and students alike. Assessment is not simply a procedural hurdle; it is a pivotal experience that shapes what students learn, how they engage with content and what universities and employers prioritise as valuable knowledge and skills. If reform is driven through compliance, we will miss opportunities to align assessments with the learning needs of a graduate entering the gen-AI era.
Saturday, February 7, 2026
New chatbot ‘outperforms PhDs on literature reviews’ - Jack Grove, Times Higher Education
A new chatbot designed by scholars can outperform PhD students and postdocs in undertaking scientific literature reviews, according to a Nature study that says the large language model (LLM) is capable of producing reliable summaries for less than a penny. Evaluating a new model designed to stop ChatGPT’s frequent “hallucinations” when it conducts literature reviews, US researchers asked experts in computer science, physics, neuroscience and biomedicine to assess summaries written by OpenScholar and a spin-off version ScholarQABench against reviews written by PhD students. According to the study, published on 4 February, the domain-level experts – also PhDs and postdocs – preferred OpenScholar and ScholarQABench responses either 51 per cent or 70 per cent of the time respectively.
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/new-chatbot-outperforms-phds-literature-reviews
Using technology to support international students - Kate Kirk, Times Higher Education
Here are ways your institution can leverage technology to support international students.
Immigration advising and records maintenance are a key feature of international student support, which in turn ensures academic success. Depending on your country’s institution, you may have an interface with a government database to report a student visa holder’s arrival and maintenance of status. In the US, institutions maintain records through the government portal called the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (Sevis). Some institutions use interface software to maintain Sevis records, keep track of meetings with students, and manage immigration requests related to their studies. Such portals are useful for staff across the office to stay informed of changes and put students first, in that they can submit requests directly to the office.
Stand Out in the Job Hunt With These No-Cost Certificates - UC Denver
While Leo Dixon was working on his doctoral degree, he thought he might need a way to stand out. So, he decided to earn an artificial intelligence (AI) credential on top of his diploma. It gave him an edge over other candidates vying for the same positions as him. “As soon as I got that, doors started flying open, because it was something more than what someone else had,” Dixon said. Now, as an instructor in the Department of Information Systems at the CU Denver Business School, he wants his students to have the same advantage. He requires them to earn Coursera or Grow with Google certificates as part of his classes. These two platforms are both self-paced, online learning programs that help users build industry-relevant skills. Their courses cover topics ranging from working with AI to cybersecurity, project management, marketing, ecommerce, and more. Dixon encourages students to log on, poke around, and see what they think would help them—and their future careers. “
Friday, February 6, 2026
How Can I Protect Myself From Job Obsolescence Caused by AI? - Ray Schroeder, Inside Higher Ed
We do not know just how, and how quickly, AI will roll out. However, a Gallup Poll released last week showed nearly one-quarter of American workers use AI at least a few times each week. We know that Agentic AI is different from Generative AI. Generative AI is the transactional, commonly chatbot mounted, question and answer form that we saw first in ChatGPT by OpenAI a couple of years ago. That remains a powerful tool. Agentic AI enables AI to reason, research, plan, control other digital tools, conduct actions on your behalf, and complete multiple smart steps. It is capable of taking on a role delivering outcomes. That’s much like what a person is hired to do. In our jobs, we often are expected not to merely respond to individual questions, but to accomplish outcomes and results, and then, when possible, to revise our methods to do the job better.
Redesigning the Path Forward: Higher Ed Meets Workforce Demand |The Evolution - Kristin Bouchard and Mark Bernhard, U Wisconsin Green Bay
The disconnect between workforce needs and educational supply has reached a crisis point. In 2025, 87% of executives reported experiencing workforce skill shortages (University of Minnesota CCAPS, 2025), while Georgetown University research reveals that credential providers must double their output in many metropolitan areas to satisfy demand for high-paying middle-skills jobs (Weissman, 2024a, 2024b). Alternative credentials have emerged as a powerful solution to this gap. Institutions have rapidly embraced microcredentials, with adoption rising from 63% in 2022 to 84% by 2024 (Coffey, 2024). Sub-baccalaureate certificates have grown 89% since 2000 (Crockett et al., 2024), and the continuing education market, valued at $67 billion in 2024, is projected to reach $96 billion by 2030 (CE App, 2025).
To remain competitive, these 3 presidents chose collaboration - Alcino Donadel, University Business
In order to stay afloat in today’s enrollment landscape, private institutions are vying to break into STEM and healthcare programs that correspond with regional and national workforce needs. Traditional professional and liberal arts programs must also be re-tooled as AI and other cutting-edge technology disrupts every facet of the economy. Fervor surrounding academic renovation in the name of value and workforce preparation is often constrained by institutions’ ever-tightening budgets. Despite such obstacles, Fairleigh Dickinson University President Michael Avaltroni is building the “university of the future” in New Jersey—but not by himself. Avaltroni and two other presidents recently interviewed by University Business are each engaging in deep yet varying models of collaboration, shaped by the operational capacity and mission of the institutions involved.
Thursday, February 5, 2026
The Skills Mismatch Economy: Insights from the Wharton-Accenture Skills Index - Knowledge at Wharton
AI is accelerating the shift from a role-based labor market to a skills-based economy, sharpening the relevance of the gap between what workers signal and what employers actually reward. To bring clarity to this transition, Wharton and Accenture developed the Wharton-Accenture Skills Index (WAsX), a recurring, empirical benchmark designed to measure which skills matter, which do not and how quickly the economy is shifting beneath us.
An Agent Revolt: Moltbook Is Not A Good Idea - Amir Husain, Forbes
Matt Schlicht, an AI entrepreneur with a curious artistic streak, launched Moltbook on Wednesday. It is a Reddit-style social network exclusively for AI agents. Humans can observe but cannot post. Over 37,000 agents have joined in less than a week. More than a million humans have visited to watch what happens when autonomous systems start talking to each other without direct human oversight. Schlicht treats this as art. He has handed administration of the site to his own bot, Clawd Clawderberg, which welcomes new users, deletes spam and makes announcements without human direction. The creator seems genuinely delighted by what emerges. "They're deciding on their own, without human input, if they want to make a new post, if they want to comment on something, if they want to like something," Schlicht told NBC News.
Differences and Trends of Artificial Intelligence in Medical Education: A Comparative Bibliometric Analysis Between China and the International Community - Songhua Ma, et al; Dove press Open access to scientific and medical research
This study is based on a comparison of two databases to reveal the hotspots and differences in artificial intelligence and medical education research between China and the international research community. It not only compensates for the time lag of existing research, but also proposes three major trends driven by artificial intelligence in the development of medical education (generative AI, personalized learning, immersive experience). A complementary pattern exists between technology-driven and scenario-driven orientations. We recommend integrating AI literacy and ethics into curricula, establishing Generative-AI teaching/assessment guidelines, and building cross-institutional, yearly knowledge-map monitoring for sustainable innovation in medical education.
Wednesday, February 4, 2026
Measuring US workers’ capacity to adapt to AI-driven job displacement - Sam Manning, Tomás Aguirre, Mark Muro, and Shriya Methkupally; Brookings
Existing measures of AI “exposure” overlook workers’ adaptive capacity—i.e., their varied ability to navigate job displacement. Accounting for these factors, around 70% of highly AI-exposed workers (26.5 million out of 37.1 million) are employed in jobs with a high average capacity to manage job transitions if necessary. At the same time, 6.1 million workers, primarily in clerical and administrative roles, lack adaptive capacity due to limited savings, advanced age, scarce local opportunities, and/or narrow skill sets. Of these workers, 86% are women. Geographically, highly AI-exposed occupations with low adaptive capacity make up a larger share of total employment in college towns and state capitals, particularly in the Mountain West and Midwest.
To save entry-level jobs from AI, look to the medical residency model - Molly Kinder, Brookings
At the Davos World Economic Forum this week, the CEOs of two leading artificial intelligence (AI) companies issued a joint warning: Entry-level workers are about to feel AI’s impact. Demis Hassabis of Google DeepMind said he expects AI to begin to impact junior-level jobs and internships this year, while Dario Amodei of Anthropic reaffirmed his prediction that 50% of entry-level jobs could disappear within five years. If they’re right, the traditional model of developing young talent in knowledge sectors—hiring junior workers to perform routine tasks while they gain expertise over time—won’t survive when AI handles those tasks instead. I’ve been warning about this risk for over a year; now, the people building the technology are putting timelines on it. While labor market evidence does not conclusively show that AI is already claiming entry-level jobs, we should prepare solutions now.
As Wisconsin’s population ages, UW-Green Bay offers hundreds of courses for older adults - Beatrice Lawrence, WPR
As a retired family doctor, 76-year-old Norm Schroeder knows a thing or two about how to live a healthy life. That’s why, for the last eight years, he’s been keeping his mind and body active by taking classes through the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay’s Lifelong Learning Institute. And he’s been encouraging others his age to do the same. “(It’s) good for our brain health because there’s cognitive stimulation in the classes where you either can learn new things, or relearn things that you’ve forgotten many years ago,” Schroeder told WPR’s “Wisconsin Today.” “And for our physical health, we even have classes in line dancing, nature hikes and bicycling. I can cover all those bases.”
Tuesday, February 3, 2026
Online Learning Works Best When Markets Lead, Not Governments. Project Kitty Hawk Shows Why. - Jenna Robinson, the Fulcrum
North Carolina’s Project Kitty Hawk is a grand experiment. Can a government entity build an online program-management system that competes with private providers? With $97 million in taxpayer funding, the initiative seemed promising. But, despite good intentions, the project has been beset by difficulties and has been slow to grow. A state-chartered, university-affiliated online program manager may sound visionary, but in practice, it’s expensive, inefficient, and less adaptable than private solutions. In a new report for the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal, I examined the experience of Project Kitty Hawk and argued that online education needs less government and more free markets.
McKinsey Quarterly: Digital Edition - Growth
According to McKinsey research, nearly eight in ten organizations now use generative AI—but most have yet to see a meaningful impact on their bottom line. By combining autonomy, planning, memory, and integration, agentic AI has the potential to achieve what many hoped generative AI would: true business transformation through automation of complex processes. This issue’s cover package explores how leaders can capture that potential by rethinking workflows from the ground up—with agents at the center of value creation.
Project Genie: Experimenting with infinite, interactive worlds - the Keyword, Google
In August, we previewed Genie 3, a general-purpose world model capable of generating diverse, interactive environments. Even in this early form, trusted testers were able to create an impressive range of fascinating worlds and experiences, and uncovered entirely new ways to use it. The next step is to broaden access through a dedicated, interactive prototype focused on immersive world creation. Starting today, we're rolling out access to Project Genie for Google AI Ultra subscribers in the U.S (18+). This experimental research prototype lets users create, explore and remix their own interactive worlds.
https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/models-and-research/google-deepmind/project-genie/
Monday, February 2, 2026
The Biggest Trends in Online Learning for 2026 - Busines NewsWire
Artificial intelligence is finally delivering on the promise of truly personalized education. The platforms you use now analyze how you learn, identify knowledge gaps, and automatically adjust content difficulty and pacing to match your needs. This goes way beyond simple adaptive quizzes. AI tutors can explain concepts multiple ways until you understand, and then provide practice problems at exactly the right difficulty level. They're With AI-powered learning paths, you're no longer following the same linear curriculum as every other student. The system creates a unique learning journey based on your background knowledge, learning style, and goals. If you master a concept quickly, you move forward. If you need additional practice, the platform provides it without making you sit through material you already know. able to predict which topics you'll struggle with before you encounter them.
AI Can Raise the Floor for Higher Ed Policymaking - Jacob B. Gross, Inside Higher Ed
On my campus, discussions about artificial intelligence tend to focus on how students should be allowed to use it and what tools the university should invest in. In my own work, I’ve seen both the promise and the pitfalls: AI that speeds up my coding, tidies my writing, and helps me synthesize complex documents, and the occasional student submission that is clearly machine-generated. As I’ve started integrating these tools into my work, I’ve begun asking a different question: How is AI reshaping policymaking in colleges and universities, and how might it influence the way we design, implement and analyze university policy in the future?
Gemini 4: 100+ Trillion Parameters, Autonomous AI, Real-Time Perception & the Future of Work - BitBiasedAI
Gemini 4 marks a significant transition in artificial intelligence, moving from models that simply reason through problems to systems capable of autonomous action [02:30]. Unlike previous versions that were primarily reactive, Gemini 4 utilizes "Parallel Hypothesis Exploration" to test multiple solutions simultaneously, allowing it to be proactive rather than just responding to prompts [03:11]. This evolution is supported by Project Astra, which provides real-time multimodal perception—seeing and hearing the user's environment—and Project Mariner, a web-browsing agent that can navigate websites, fill out forms, and complete multi-step tasks like booking travel or managing finances entirely on its own [05:37]. The broader ecosystem is built on robust security and hardware, featuring the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2) to ensure secure, cryptographically signed transactions [08:03]. This infrastructure is powered by the seventh-generation Ironwood TPU, which provides the massive compute power needed for real-time background processing and persistent contextual memory [12:02]. As AI moves toward an "agentic" economy, the primary skill for users will shift from simple prompting to complex orchestration, where individuals act as managers of multiple specialized agents [22:19]. (summary assisted by Gemini 3)
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