US university offers cut-price UK degree for international students - Andrew Jack, Financial Times

Michael Crow, president of Arizona State University, said he aimed to expand to an annual intake of up to 4,000 students in the UK in the coming years. A small cohort has begun pilot business, engineering and computer science degrees this autumn on ASU’s new London campus. “We are making this as affordable as possible,” said Crow, a pioneer of lower-cost and online learning in the US, including with the widespread use of AI. “We are looking at how we can eliminate excessive fees and grow more efficiently by using technology in ways to enhance learning.” The move will allow ASU to expand its offerings to British students and provide a base outside the US for American students who prefer to study elsewhere, as well as students from other countries seeking alternatives to the US following President Donald Trump’s hostility to immigration and attacks on universities.

https://www.ft.com/content/690d164b-58d4-4edc-951d-1cd35bc13bd0?syn-25a6b1a6=1

Why Hands-On Training Still Matters in a Digital Age - Michael Burke, Occupational Health and Safety

Over the last quarter century, computer-based and online learning have become basic components of many emergency and disaster response training programs. But in recent years, more advanced forms of technology such as virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), serious games and now artificial intelligence (AI) are increasingly being explored as immersive tools to integrate into training as well. When applied with care and rigor, these technologies can helpfully supplement learning. But decades of workplace safety research suggest that live, in-person training remains critical for many reasons. Understanding these reasons will help organizations strike a balance between delegating the right amount of training to VR/AR or AI as appropriate and, for other forms of training that will be discussed here, sticking to the tried and true method of hands-on approaches.

https://ohsonline.com/articles/2026/10/print/why-hands-on-training-still-matters-in-a-digital-age.aspx

AI in the Business Classroom: Building Better Thinkers in Macroeconomics - University of Dayton

Artificial intelligence is changing how students access information. For Marlon Williams, associate professor of economics, that isn't a challenge. It's an opportunity to help students think more deeply. In ECO 204: Principles of Macroeconomics, Williams uses AI to reinforce learning rather than replace it, reflecting the University of Dayton School of Business Administration's approach to integrating AI as a tool that strengthens the human side of education."Information is ubiquitous," Williams says. "Students can access answers instantly. So the goal isn't just delivering information—it's helping them understand it, evaluate it critically, and use it wisely." That philosophy led Williams to create a customized AI tutor built around his lectures, course materials and teaching style. Rather than discouraging AI use, he teaches students how to use it intentionally.

https://udayton.edu/blogs/business/2026/26-ai-eco-williams.php

AI Isn’t the Problem. We Are. - Louis-Francois P. Belanger and Zakiriya H. Gladney, Harvard Crimson

As students, part of our engagement with our education is externally motivated — and reasonably so. Competitive admissions select for students who treat knowledge as capital, something to acquire and exchange for other goods: we pursue grades, summer programs, and extracurriculars to get into selective universities. Once we get to Harvard, these pressures return as the pressures to compete for post-grad opportunities. Many of us are also motivated, at least in part, by curiosity; the burning drive for understanding. Even among the more extrinsically motivated, cultivating curiosity is well worth the while. Curiosity has been shown to increase creativity, enhance memory, foster a sense of meaning in life, and promote engagement with one’s work. When coupled with effort, it even matches intelligence as a predictor of academic performance. Teach a man, and he learns for a day. Teach a man to love learning, and he learns for a lifetime. Suppose we make cultivating curiosity a primary goal of higher education. Then, even in fields one chooses primarily for employment — say, perhaps no longer, computer science — the task of the university is to bestow the love of learning computer science on the student. The development of specific skills and knowledge employed in computer science follows incidentally.

https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2026/10/14/gladney-belanger-harvard-ai-curiosity/

You Still Should Go To College In The Age Of AI. Here’s Why. - Jamie Merisotis, Forbes

Rapid advancements in artificial intelligence have raised uncertainty about jobs and the value of college. According to the Pew Research Center, young adults increasingly worry about AI taking jobs. No job is entirely AI-proof, creating a need for education and training that emphasizes human skills and adaptability. For college to remain valuable, it must become more affordable and quickly pivot to prepare people for technology-integrated jobs. Higher education must cultivate durable skills, such as critical thinking, problem-solving, and interpersonal communication, alongside specific subject skills to help workers succeed alongside machines.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiemerisotis/2026/10/13/you-still-should-go-to-college-in-the-age-of-ai-heres-why/

The Artificial Intelligence (AI)-Powered Tutoring and Adaptive Learning Market Is Projected to Hit $20.6 Billion by 2030 - National Law Review

The rise of artificial intelligence in education is transforming how learners engage with content and receive personalized support. AI-powered tutoring and adaptive learning technologies are becoming central to this shift, enabling customized educational experiences across various settings. Let’s explore the current market landscape, growth drivers, regional trends, and key factors shaping this rapidly evolving sector. Market Growth Prospects in AI-Powered Tutoring and Adaptive Learning. 

The market for artificial intelligence (AI)-powered tutoring and adaptive learning has experienced rapid expansion recently. It is projected to grow from $8.09 billion in 2025 to $9.79 billion in 2026, representing a strong compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 20.9%. This increase during the historic period reflects a rising adoption of digital learning platforms, broader internet availability, heightened demand for personalized education, growth in online certification programs, and increasing investments in education technology.

https://natlawreview.com/press-releases/artificial-intelligence-ai-powered-tutoring-and-adaptive-learning-market

Georgia Tech And Emory Invest More Than $1 Billion In Artificial Intelligence - Amit Chowdh, Pulse 2

Georgia Tech and Emory University are collectively investing more than $1 billion in artificial intelligence infrastructure, research, talent, and applications as part of an effort to establish Atlanta as a leading U.S. AI hub.The combined commitment includes approximately $600 million from Emory and more than $575 million from Georgia Tech. The universities said the investment is intended to strengthen Georgia’s ability to attract businesses, skilled workers, private investment, and federal research funding. Georgia Tech is concentrating its investments on advanced computing, AI research, and workforce development. Emory’s investments focus on AI talent, healthcare applications, and the use of the technology across medicine, business, law, humanities, and ethics.

https://pulse2.com/georgia-tech-and-emory-invest-more-than-1-billion-in-artificial-intelligence/amp/

What’s the value of a university education? - Mariianne Mays Wiebe, University of Manitoba Today

What is the role of the university in the face of the major societal shift represented by artificial intelligence? Universities should continue to “embrace our role as institutions where students learn how to think, not what to think,” says Hiebert-Murphy. A university education, she suggests, “offers a learning environment in which students develop the skills to think critically, engage deeply with challenging issues, evaluate information, generate creative solutions to complex problems and work collaboratively with others towards shared goals.” Engaging with diverse mentors and learners also develops leadership skills and exposes students to different perspectives. “These have been, and continue to be, essential skills for participating in society and contributing to its social, economic, intellectual, environmental, physical and cultural well-being,” she says.

https://umtoday.ca/stories/whats-value-university-education

Are communication skills still important in the age of AI? Research says yes - RM Barton, Purdue

 In an artificial intelligence (AI)-mediated world, many professionals are seeking skills that will help them weather technological shifts and find career stability. Emerging research suggests that the skills the future job market will demand most are skills that technology cannot replace or replicate: people skills. According to the McKinsey Global Institute, the importance of people skills will likely be emphasized by generative AI. Professionals who know how to work with other people, lead effectively, manage projects, communicate well and collaborate with AI as expert prompters and reviewers will fare better than professionals without these skills. Communication is one such people skill that is becoming more important in the age of AI. Looking at today’s complex organizational environment, the reasons are clear. Effective communicators can help companies avoid costly communication disasters and public relations (PR) missteps. They can also collaborate with AI tools to develop better prompts and outputs, create messages that connect with human audiences and AI search engines alike, build trust with stakeholders, and manage important relationships.

https://www.purdue.edu/online/are-communication-skills-still-important-in-the-age-of-ai-research-says-yes/

The Superintelligence Force: A Moment to Reconsider the Pace and Nature of AI - Ray Schroeder, Inside Higher Ed

I am not entirely convinced that the “Superintelligence Force” is the best way to cool down the competition and slow down the race. However, here we are. This is the only available opportunity to cool down the competition and pursue a safer approach to further development. Although higher education was not heavily consulted in the preparation of this model, we will be impacted by the priorities and products that are produced as a result. Hence, we should actively seek inclusion in the process. We must also recognize that hundreds of other development efforts are being pursued in smaller independent as well as larger military and other governmental initiatives around the world. Some of these are providing open-source solutions that can then be further developed and applied by unregulated actors.

https://www.insidehighered.com/index%2ephp/opinion/columns/online-trending-now/2026/10/16/superintelligence-force-reconsidering-pace-ai

Workforce in motion: Skills and pathways to future jobs in the United States - María Jesús Ramírez, Kweilin Ellingrud, Tanguy Catlin, Diego Castresana, and Anna Kortis -McKinsey

AI, automation, and broader structural trends are accelerating the reallocation of work across the US economy. Capturing its benefits requires developing new professional pathways and skills, and reducing barriers between declining and growing occupations. The US economy could create more jobs in the next decade than will be replaced through automation, but the change may require the largest and most sustained workforce transformation in US history. Jobs of the future, particularly growing jobs, could pay more on average but require more skills. Roughly 60 percent of growing employment could be in the top two wage quintiles, with much of the increase concentrated in healthcare, construction, and management occupations. Conversely, more than 70 percent of declining employment could be in the bottom two quintiles, primarily in office and administrative support, retail and sales, and transportation and logistics occupations.

https://www.mckinsey.com/mgi/our-research/workforce-in-motion-skills-and-pathways-to-future-jobs-in-the-united-states

From AGI to ASI - Tim Genewein, et al; arXiv

After characterizing ASI, the report discusses four potential pathways from AGI to ASI: scaling AGI, AI paradigm shifts, recursive improvement, and ASI emerging from large-scale multi-agent collectives. The report then discusses possible frictions and bottlenecks along these pathways. Determining whether the impact of these frictions will be negligible or substantial raises a number of concrete open research questions. Due to large uncertainties for predicting ASI progress, it cannot be ruled out that AI progress might continue to accelerate over the next years. This could imply that the image of a single transformative step change, caused by the introduction of human-level AGI into our society, could be inaccurate. More apt might be the prospect of a series of transformative societal changes caused by AI-enabled progress and breakthroughs across many areas of science and technology. Preparing for this prospect requires a massively interdisciplinary endeavour of global scope and interest.

https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.12683

The AI industry is booming. Women are getting left behind - the Guardian.org

Women made up only about a quarter of new hires in AI roles in the last year, compared to 50% of new hires in non-AI roles, according to a recent report from LinkedIn. In executive roles, that number drops to just 13%. At the same time, LinkedIn’s research shows that women are more likely to work in roles with high exposure to AI disruption, like customer service, meaning they are also at higher risk for job loss due to AI. AI jobs, whose postings have doubled since 2023, come with a salary premium, on average paying more than twice as much as roles that don’t involve working with AI, according to LinkedIn’s research. But women who do have jobs in AI are disproportionately concentrated in low-paying roles, like data annotators, said Sarah Steinberg, the head of global public policy partnerships at LinkedIn. Across all AI occupations, men have $45,000 higher median pay than women, partly due to the types of jobs they are likelier to have. “AI is creating some of the fastest growing, highest paying and most consequential jobs in the global economy,” said Steinberg. “Women are just strikingly underrepresented.”

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/oct/04/women-ai-jobs-inequality

Community knowledge belongs at the heart of higher education - Jack Layton and Sue Griffiths, University World News

In recent years, universities in the United Kingdom have scrutinised their relationships with neighbouring communities – exploring what these should and could look like. That requires asking what it takes to undertake meaningful community engagement, how their research can contribute to local economic growth and how their facilities can be repurposed to support local health and well-being.Part of this is about recognising that the traditional academic ecosystem can be detached from people’s everyday lives and concerns. Data extracted from places. Research trapped behind paywalls. Value derived from rankings and citations. Last week, the Institute for Community Studies at the Young Foundation launched the Journal for Community Studies. The journal brings academic research into direct conversation with community voice, lived experience and practical knowledge. It challenges a persistent imbalance in how evidence is produced and valued, where communities are too often treated as subjects of study rather than partners in inquiry.

https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20260930112346517

Friendship is built over time, through ordinary moments – I teach lonely college students to notice them - Justin Vaughn, the Conversation

Many new students want close relationships, but feel anxious about initiating them and have had little practice sustaining them.I realized that my students rarely spoke to one another, and went entire semesters without learning their classmates’ names. Many students seemed unsure how to cross the few feet between them and their peers and make the social connection they craved. Factual. Free. For everyone. I designed a freshman honors seminar, “Friendship & Society,” around this uncertainty, combining the academic study of friendship with practical exercises in forming and sustaining it.

https://theconversation.com/friendship-is-built-over-time-through-ordinary-moments-i-teach-lonely-college-students-to-notice-them-291953

Stanford apologizes, saying AI-altered photo that changed student’s gender and race violated policy -Minyvonne Burke, NBC

Stanford University said the use of artificial intelligence to alter the race and appearance of students in a promotional photo violated its policy and was “a serious error in judgment.” The controversy centers on an image of three students posing in front of Star Ginger in the university’s dining hall, according to The Stanford Review, the student-run newspaper, which first reported the story. The original photo shows a female student and two male students holding their plates as they pose for the camera. The altered image shows one of the male students replaced with an AI-generated Black female student. The two other people in the altered image were made to look noticeably slimmer. The Review reported that Stanford Residential & Dining Enterprises used the altered image in its advertisements. Its editor in chief, Garret Molloy, said the altered photos were placed on welcome banners around campus.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/stanford-apologizes-saying-ai-altered-pic-changed-students-gender-race-rcna599691

When Nontraditional Students Become the Norm - Joshua Bay, Inside Higher Ed

Adult learners, working students, student parents, transfer students and first-generation students are often grouped under the broad umbrella of “nontraditional” students. While their experiences differ, they also highlight the various ways higher education is, or isn’t, designed around the realities of students’ lives. Many of these students are navigating similar pressures: balancing college with work and family responsibilities, managing financial challenges and figuring out systems that weren’t necessarily built with them in mind. And as these experiences become increasingly common across higher education, they raise a bigger question: If so-called nontraditional students reflect the reality of today’s college population, does it still make sense to call them nontraditional?

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/student-success/college-experience/2026/09/24/when-nontraditional-students-become-norm

U of Kentucky Online recognizes faculty, staff for excellence in online teaching - Lindsey Piercy, UKnow

Three faculty members and four staff members were honored Sept. 16 during the University of Kentucky Online Awards ceremony, which featured the inaugural presentation of the UK Online Teaching Award. Now in its second year, the UKO Advocate recognition expands the UKO Excellence Awards by giving UK Online staff an opportunity to nominate faculty or staff members who work closely with them to support online teaching and learning across the university. The four UKO Excellence Award recipients are staff members nominated by their peers for their contributions to UK Online. Established in 2024, the UKO Excellence Awards provide an opportunity for the unit to celebrate its accomplishments and recognize staff members who contribute to its success.

https://uknow.uky.edu/professional-news/uk-online-recognizes-faculty-staff-excellence-online-teaching

The economics of AI - McKinsey Quarterly

The economics of AI - McKinsey Quarterly

AI is getting more expensive for companies. As rising token usage and workflow complexity make costs harder to predict, leaders need new ways to manage AI economics. Even with token prices falling, AI operating costs keep rising. Companies that get it right understand the six drivers behind this gap.

https://www.mckinsey.com/quarterly/the-five-fifty/five-fifty-the-economics-of-ai

Recursive Self-Improvement of AI Without Comprehensive Review and Alignment - Ray Schroeder, Inside Higher Ed

In the high-tech, high-competition AI field, we are seeing new versions of models rolled out by the frontier companies (OpenAI, Google and Anthropic) every month and a half. I included a Release Cadence Breakdown report by Google Gemini in the “Online: Trending Now” column just a few weeks ago. The speed and intensity of the research and development required to keep up such a release schedule has taken a toll on the necessary, thorough testing of reliability and alignment that we all expect must be done by reliable creators. It is important to remember that this field is breaking new ground in creating models that can generate original concepts, often by mimicking approaches humans have taken in the past. Humans, of course, are not always the best models of safe, generous and legal behaviors. That’s where the problems arise.

https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/columns/online-trending-now/2026/09/30/ai-recursive-self-improvement-without-review-and

How should AI be regulated? - Claire Goudreau, Johns Hopkins University

Gillian Hadfield | Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of AI Alignment and Governance said "The key thing that happened was humans stopped writing all of the rules about how the computer was supposed to behave and figured out a method called machine learning where the machine, the computer, would write its own program. People will talk about guardrails, safety. We don't know what those should be. Technology moves faster than governments do. That's the pacing problem and the reason to slow down. ... We absolutely need our research universities to be taking this on as a mission because this is where the brain trust needs to be for how we figure out how to make this go well."

https://hub.jhu.edu/2026/09/17/next-conversations-governing-ai/