[HN Gopher] Purdue University Approves New AI Requirement for Al...
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Purdue University Approves New AI Requirement for All Undergrads
Author : rmason
Score : 32 points
Date : 2025-12-13 20:54 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.forbes.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.forbes.com)
| conartist6 wrote:
| Well that's a public embarrassment...
| andy99 wrote:
| That was my thought, it feels like something a career college
| or high school would do. Are CS students going to have to take
| a "how to talk to chat gpt course"? That's probably less
| condescending than making an arts student or someone else that
| doesn't need to have anything to do with LLMs have to sit
| through it.
|
| I though Purdue was a good school, these kind of gimmicks are
| usually the province of low-tier universities trying to get
| attention.
| turtleyacht wrote:
| Optimistically, the idea could be to push prerequisites to an
| always-on, ever-available resource. Depending on the major,
| skills could include organizing papers into outlines, using
| Excel, or building a computer.
|
| Professors can tailor lectures to narrower topics or
| advanced, current, or more specialized subjects. There may be
| less need to have a series of beginning or introductory
| courses--it's assumed learners will avail themselves.
|
| Pessimistically, AI literacy contributes to further erosion
| of critical thinking, lazy auto-grading, and inability to
| construct book-length arguments.
| djoldman wrote:
| The announcement is here:
|
| https://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/2025/Q4/purdue-unveils-compr...
|
| Where the actual news is:
|
| > To this end, the trustees have delegated authority to the
| provost, working with deans of all academic colleges, to develop
| and to review and update continuously, discipline-specific
| criteria and proficiency standards for a new campuswide
| "artificial intelligence working competency" graduation
| requirement for all Purdue main campus students, starting with
| new beginners in fall 2026.
|
| So the Purdue trustees have "delegated authority" to people at
| the University to make a new graduation requirement for 2026.
|
| Who knows what will be in the final.
| gmfawcett wrote:
| Delegated to the _provost and deans_. Who else would you expect
| to hold accountable for developing a graduate attribute?
| brian-armstrong wrote:
| https://archive.ph/g1a1X
| turtleyacht wrote:
| Upfront computer literacy may have never been convincing enough;
| AI could be the ubiquitous and timely leverage to open the way
| for general machine thinking.
| noitpmeder wrote:
| How to Speedrun devaluing the credentials your institution exists
| to award.
| gamblor956 wrote:
| This is going to be like when all the schools were pushing big
| data because that was going to be the next big thing.
|
| After more than a trillion dollars spent, LLMs can replace: (a) a
| new secretary with one week of experience (b) a junior programmer
| who just learned that they can install programs on a desktop
| computer, and (c) James Patterson.
|
| That's the bright future that Purdue is preparing its students
| for.
|
| Yes, AIs will be a huge thing...eventually...but LLMs are not AI,
| and they never will be.
| andy99 wrote:
| This has nothing to do with whether the technology is valuable
| or not, it's about cramming superficial treatment of trendy
| topics into academic degree rewuirements, which whatever one
| thinks of AI should be frowned upon.
| ivape wrote:
| It's definitely something that won't age well. Kids are going
| to grow up with many AI friends by the time they get to
| college.
| keiferski wrote:
| I don't really get the dismissive comments here. Universities
| have had gen ed requirements for years, one of which is usually
| something to do with computers. AI seems to be a technology that
| will be increasingly relevant...so a basic gen ed requirement
| seems logical.
| alephnerd wrote:
| These are the same people who would pooh-pooh teaching Excel
| and basic coding skills to non-STEM majors or have CS students
| take ethics or GenEd classes.
|
| AI/ML isn't going to completely shift the world, but
| understanding how to do basic prompt engineering, validate
| against hallucinations, and know what the difference between
| ChatGPT and GPT-4o is valuable for people who do not have a
| software background.
|
| Gaining any kind of knowledge is a net win.
| hansmayer wrote:
| "basic prompt engineering" - Since when has writing English
| language sentences become nothing less than "engineering" ?
| UncleEntity wrote:
| Yeah, I'm still bitter I had to pass a literacy exam to get my
| BA and that was 28 years ago.
|
| And I just know this is going to turn into a (pearl-clutching)
| AI Ethics course...
| BeetleB wrote:
| The problem is the field is changing way too fast. It's almost
| certain that whatever they'll learn will be outdated/wrong/poor
| practice by the time they graduate. Just compare with the state
| of things 2 years ago.
| jleyank wrote:
| From my long-ago uni courses, current-day AI could have helped
| with the non-major courses: English and History, doing the first
| draft or even the final drafts of papers, etc. As a science
| major, I'm not sure what the point of relying on an AI is as it
| would leave you empty when considering further education or the
| tests they require. And as far as a foreign language goes, one
| needs to at least read the stuff without relying on Google
| Translate (assuming they have such a requirement anymore).
|
| But I like to think that actually learning the history was
| important and it certainly was a diversion from
| math/chemistry/physics. I liked Shakespeare, so reading the plays
| was also worthwhile and discussing them in class was fun. Yeah, I
| was bored to tears in medieval history, so AI could have helped
| there.
| conartist6 wrote:
| It'll get you an academic integrity investigation if you get
| caught using it to write either a first draft or a final draft
| of a paper, and _especially_ for an English class where the
| whole point is for you to learn how to write.
|
| If you're going to try to fake being able to write, better to
| try to dupe any other professor than a professor of English.
| (source: raised by English majors)
| dehrmann wrote:
| Full disclose: I'm a Purdue graduate, though I disagree with
| certain things the school has done (Purdue Global).
|
| Part of this is very reasonable; AI is upending how students
| learn (or cheat), so adding a requirement to teach how to do it
| in a way that improves learning rather than just enhances
| cheating makes sense. The problem with the broad, top-down
| approach is it looks like what happens in Corporate America where
| there's a CEO edict that "we need a ____ strategy," and every
| department pivots projects to include that, whether or not it
| makes sense.
| daxfohl wrote:
| I like this take. It seems like it would be useful to require
| professors to sit in on the class too. It'd be interesting to
| hear lots of different perspectives, ideas, concerns, etc.,
| rather than a lecture format to half-awake students about
| something they arguably know more about than the instructor.
| mwkaufma wrote:
| Heads up: forbes.com/sites/xyz are ppl and groups who pay for the
| domain, but aren't edited or promoted by forbes itself. Almost
| always conservative interest groups posing as journalists.
| andy99 wrote:
| Yes this has conservative psy-op written all over it /s
| mwkaufma wrote:
| Nietzel's whole shtick is "college reform" i.e. dismantling
| and financialization. See his book "Coming to Grips with
| Higher Education." Mixing non-agitprop into the feed is part
| of agitprop.
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