Why Universities and Professors Won’t Go Away Anytime Soon

AI will change higher ed but it may never fully replace the college experience.

ChatGPT and other generative AI have been the main topic of university faculty and administrators. Beside the obvious, “will AI enable students to cheat?”, generative AI has raised many questions, such as:

• how should professors use generative AI in the classroom?

• how should professors use generative AI for research?

• will generative AI replace professors?

• will generative AI replace universities?

I think generative AI will definitely change the university teaching and research but these topics merit a different essay I will write at a later time. Now I’d like to address the last two questions on the ability of AI to replace professors and universities.

My argument is that AI will augment and change higher education but not replace faculty and universities because, for the moment at least, the two provide value add that AI cannot at this point in time (or perhaps ever).

Generative AI Will Disrupt Education

This is not to say generative AI will not have a major impact on universities. It will, especially as academia was ripe for disruption even before the ChatGPT storm appeared over the landscape.

We in academia think we are in the Finding Truth business or the Preparing for a Job business, and we are. But we are also very much in the Credentialing business and that business and that value proposition is in trouble. Here are a few reasons why:

1. Most Americans believe university degrees are no longer worth paying for.
   According to a recent WSJ/NORC poll, a majority of Americans (56%) believe a four-year college degree is "not worth the cost because people often graduate without specific job skills and with a large amount of debt." This finding has been replicated in several studies recently

2. The cost of credentials is too high and it continues to rise.
   In 1980, the annual cost of tuition, fees, room and board to attend a four-year university was about $10K. Now it’s roughly tripled to about $30K per year, after adjusting for inflation. In 1980, average student debt was roughly $13K at graduation. Now it is over $30K, more than doubling after adjusting for inflation.

3. Alternative credentialing options are increasing in number and attractiveness.
   Universities have responded to a demand for certificates for certain skills with alacrity, which has for the most part been a good thing. However, it does risk cannibalizing the value of a full degree.
   
   More importantly, other players have entered the credentialing game, such as Google, with its portfolio of certificate offerings. These alternatives offer potential students options other than fulltime college.
   

4. Need for degrees may fall. Employers are realizing many of their jobs may not require university degrees. This includes major employers such as states. Several states are dropping degree requirements for employment. And politicians, such as former president Obama, are pushing companies to drop that requirement as well.

It’s axiomatic in the business world that major technological changes disrupt industries (e.g., the internet and travel agents). Therefore, we should expect generative AI to disrupt higher education as well.

Why Professors Won’t Go Away Anytime Soon

While generative AI will change how professors teach, it will not replace them. The value professors bring to students are irreplaceable by AI. What comprises this value?

• Professors provide a curriculum of study for specific topics.
  The word, “curriculum” comes from the “Latin verb, “currere,” meaning to run, the noun curriculum verbally translates as “racecourse.”’ When professors create a course, they set the “course” the students will need to complete to master the subject. They decide the subtopics to be studied, the order in which they are covered, the books and other material to be used, and the assignments and exams to test the student. This is significant value add.
  
  Sure, you could ask ChatGPT to give you the curriculum for a course (I have, and it does a good job!) and then for each topic you could ask it to explain that topic. But that takes significant initiative and time on the student’s part.
  
  Beyond the course curriculum, the department faculty as a whole decide the degree curriculum. In essence, faculty package the process and content of learning around specific disciplines. Again, this is possibly replaceable, but would take a lot of effort on a student’s part. Ready-made curricula are a turnkey solution for students.
  
  In fact, the origin of the word, “faculty” comes from a Latin word meaning “to make easy,” the same root that gives us “facilitate” and “facile”.

• Domain knowledge.
  Professors provide the mental models, concepts and frameworks to students, giving them the means to analyze the subject at hand. Faculty have the facts and data available in their heads as well as the context that surround those. They have examples and analogies that help explain the subject. Lastly, they have tacit knowledge - this is knowledge that isn’t easily codified or explained but tends to come up when students ask professors questions.

• Pedagogy & Style.
  Professors are human and the best of them have excellent teaching skills and tricks and are fun and interesting to interact with as people. These traits make the classroom an enjoyable and productive place to learn. Good faculty know how to make lectures engaging, bring in experiential learning, invite compelling guest speakers, answer questions insightfully, and offer useful assessment feedback. AI can be very patient and responsive (it’s available 24x7 and very responsive), but it cannot replicate these human traits yet.

• Mentoring and Career Guidance.

  Professors, especially those who work in professional schools, can offer students mentoring and guidance about potential careers and jobs. Faculty, especially those who have worked outside of academia, can explain to students the types of jobs that may be available to them with their degree and the pros and cons of those positions. Yes, AI can do this as well, but these professors can speak from their experience and add insights based on that experience.

• Connections and Recommendations.
  Experienced faculty have strong connections to industry, guest speakers and other faculty. As such, they can help students learn more as well as get a job after graduation. Professors can also provide recommendations that will assist students in pursuing opportunities during their time at university as well as beyond.

Why Universities Won’t Go Away Anytime Soon

Universities provide a great deal of value to young people that AI cannot replicate.

• The College Experience
  Going to college is an essential part of the American Dream for the cognitive class and those wishing to join it. Countless movies have been made about it, featuring young students, wise professors, ivy-covered buildings, and autumn trees. It’s a rite of passage many aspire to, offering newfound freedom, the excitement of meeting new people, the potential for young love, exciting social events, football & basketball games, adult beverages, and (oh yes) learning about something that interests and excites you. AI is not going to replace that anytime soon.

• Credentialing.
  While the threats mentioned above are very real, the college degree still is a requirement for many jobs. And for those going to elite schools, it’s also a marker that sets them apart from others for life. Having an elite school on your resume is a sure way to get employers’ attention. Being able to say you graduated from an elite school gives you instant credibility and respect when meeting others.

• Career Training, Selection and Placement.

  While we in academia hope young people come to college to seek truth and become better humans, as you can see from the chart below, the main driver is to get a job.

  

  Universities facilitate that process not just by providing employment training via their curriculum, but also through career advising, academic support, and placement opportunities. The better universities bring a host of employers to campus, enabling their students to gain interviews and job offers. This is a huge part of universities’ value proposition and something AI cannot offer.

• Alumni Networks.
  Top universities have strong alumni networks students can go to for advice and a hand up the ladder. The best have nationwide and even global networks while even the smaller ones have local networks.

• Extracurriculars.
  International opportunities, Greek organizations, sports teams, great facilities such as gyms and libraries and local eateries are all part of the college value proposition.

A Caveat…

Let me offer a “yes, but…” here. It is entirely possible universities may use AI to replace some professors for certain courses or tasks. To a certain extent, they are doing this already via asynchronous videos for online courses. However, those professors still teach and are also reimbursed for their videos. But I do want to mention this as a possibility.

AI is Great but…

The combination of universities and professors offers value that AI simply cannot replicate. It’s a total package and very compelling, which is why universities have been able to raise tuition without totally cratering the number of students who are interested in coming.

So, like it or not, universities are not going the way of monasteries. Both are institutions of the middle ages but only universities have maintained and even grown their value to individuals and society.

Again, this doesn’t mean academia can be complacent about AI. Administrators and faculty need to think hard about how to augment their value via AI. But worrying away about them being replaced wholesale anytime soon…it’s not going to happen.