Artificial intelligence (AI) has sparked a number of conversations in higher education. While some professors and students consider the use of AI in the classroom unethical and count it as plagiarism, other departments encourage the use of it on a near daily basis for idea generation and help with simple tasks.
Elizabethtown College, trying to get ahead of the trends around AI and technology, has decided to replace their entire study body with AI students created and trained by the computer science department at Etown. These AI students, who will be faceless and only exist to do work and turn in assignments, will emulate the students of Etown without the pesky individuality and voices that often get in the way of learning. Etown’s professors will then be tasked to train the students in each of their respective fields and eventually train AI to replace them as well.
While these changes come with concerns from some students, others embrace the direction Etown plans to go in.
“Honestly, as a sociology major, I’m in favor,” junior Em Clark said. “One department down, why not cut the rest?”
This change eases growing concerns around the budget and morale of Etown. This comes at a time where human students come with too
high of a price and pressure. Students have needs and even worse wants of something better and each cohort getting bigger means even more voices to consider. Rather than account for housing concerns, the cost of keeping the lights on in every building across campus, and food accommodations for students who constantly complain about the quality of the Marketplace, all they have to do is pay for the electricity of running the AI students and keep some of their staff hired.
While the direction may come as a surprise to some, it represents the wider state of higher education and the professional world. Etown professors can no longer waste their time teaching dozing-off and AI-utilizing students and can instead train the workers of the future. With AI slowly taking over much of the job sectors, those AI students will be the ones who will donate to the campus in the future while human students struggle to find positions.
AI, additionally, will not provide their professors or the institution with negative reviews. This will create a stronger connection between the AI students and the institution. AI students may then want to donate more to the institution in the future than human students do and will not need the institution to give them anything in return.
On a related note, 100% of the new AI incoming class expressed excitement with Etown and had no notes on how the institution could improve moving forward. This contentment shows the benefit of a fresh start.
All students currently attending the institution will be begrudgingly allowed to finish their major of choice. The transition ahead will begin in the upcoming class of 2029. All students who anticipated to attend Etown in the fall as first-years have now been sent letters of rejection and rescinded offers, saving Etown hundreds of thousands in scholarship. Etown then hopes that eventually the entire campus will solely benefit AI students, professors, and administration.
Overall, Etown plans to adapt to survive increased expenses in higher education and with that comes a change to the face or interface of the student body. While human students will be mildly missed by their professors and the wider Etown community, a new exciting future awaits all of Etown.
