Universities at a turning point in an era of AI insecurity

As artificial intelligence and global insecurity challenge university leaders worldwide, it is more important than ever for universities to remain true to their fundamental principles, according to the President of the American Council on Education (ACE), Ted Mitchell.

“Independence, intellectual inquiry and academic excellence, inclusion, [and] the expectation that education is a good to be consumed by all of our citizens – these are things that we can’t compromise (on),” he said via video link to a conference of global university leaders of the International Association of University Presidents (IAUP) this week in Seoul, South Korea.

As universities face what one keynote speaker described as an “existential crisis”, university leaders not only need to reimagine higher education, but also need to do so with urgency in order to tackle emerging political and technological issues, the conference heard. It was part of the conference theme: ‘Higher Education Reimagined: Innovation, Inclusion, and Global Collaboration in the AI Era.’

The 13 to 15 October conference brought together about 180 university leaders and participants from 28 countries to take stock of IAUP’s legacy – this year it marks its 60th anniversary – combined with a forward-looking dialogue on the future of higher education.

IAUP Secretary-General Tatsuro Tanioka, who is vice-chancellor of Tamioka Gakuen Education Foundation, Japan, told the conference the organisation’s 60th anniversary represented more than a milestone.

In many East Asian cultures, 60 years marks the completion of a life cycle. For IAUP, it is a moment to be ‘reborn’ to brace the challenges ahead, he said.

Korea’s Education Minister Choi Kyo-jin told the conference “in this era of AI and digital innovation, universities must go beyond the simple transmission of knowledge to create new value and nurture global talent capable of addressing humanity’s shared challenges”.

IAUP Vice-President for Asia and the Middle East Eunjoo Lee, who is president of Seoul Cyber University (SCU), which hosted the conference, told University World News: “What we need today is not only reflection but a fundamental reimagining of the purpose and direction of higher education – even to envision something that has not yet existed.”

The conference theme “reflects a critical turning point for universities worldwide. While higher education has experienced continuous change, the core structure of what and how we teach has remained largely the same for centuries.

However, with the full emergence of the AI era, the traditional model of knowledge transmission has reached its limits”, Lee explained.

She added: “We now face an unprecedented crisis: the rapid decline of stable jobs for graduates, the erosion of the social value of university degrees, and diminishing public and private support for higher education. Universities can no longer rely on past assumptions.

“Yet no single institution can confront these challenges alone. This is why global dialogue and collaboration among higher education leaders are indispensable.”

Embracing AI

She added that in this context, embracing AI-driven innovation is not optional but inevitable.

SCU is South Korea’s first fully online university and represents one of the emerging trends shaping the future of learning, Lee said, pointing to the conference theme of “reimagining” higher education.

Her institution aims to be an “AI-leading” university, integrating artificial intelligence across disciplines, curricula, and teaching methods, while requiring all students to complete a specialised AI application track and explore alternative career paths, she said.

“These efforts are not recent initiatives but the result of 25 years of continuous commitment to innovation. And they will continue, as SCU remains dedicated to redefining higher education in the age of AI,” she noted.

Arturo Cherbowski, the general director of Universia México, in his address, titled “Crisis and disruptions in higher education: the need for reinvention and going back to basics”, told the conference “what is missing from the conception of reimagining education? It's a sense of urgency that universities worldwide are facing”.

Cherbowski cautioned that the conference’s ‘reimagining’ theme risked underplaying “a crisis of existential dimensions”.

Cherbowski, who also serves as executive director of Santander Universities, the bank’s philanthropic arm providing funding and opportunities for education, employment and entrepreneurship, said many institutions missed the transformation opportunities offered by the pandemic, reverting to pre-pandemic operations with little sense of urgency.

Now, AI-driven disruption threatens to make institutions obsolete if they fail to reinvent their curriculum, teaching, and operating models.

“It’s very rare, even in countries riddled with poverty and exclusion, that they don’t have one of these [a smartphone] in their pockets,” he said. “They have access to anything as a transmission of knowledge that one of their professors can give them.”

Yet, according to Cherbowski, universities continue to fund bloated faculties whose skill sets no longer align with current realities. Drawing parallels with the private sector, he noted: “Most large transnational corporations in every segment now have plans in place to cut about 30% of their labour force in the next three to four years.”

“If we didn’t get the warning signs before,” Cherbowski said, “we now need to have the warning signs in front of us and take them with a sense of urgency – like the newborn baby crying in anger from being born.”

Pressure of political influence

But AI disruption is only part of the challenge, as universities also face mounting financial pressures and political interference.

“For the last 20 years – despite little blips and exceptions – public money for universities has consistently gone down. And this is not a syndrome of one particular country,” Cherbowski pointed out.

Where public funding exists, it is also increasingly influenced by what he termed “short-term political interests” and “electoral rentability”.

Meanwhile, populist governments continue to criticise institutions as elitist or detached from societal needs. For private universities, raising tuition to offset declining public support has limits, with no “infinite elasticity”, he warned.

The rising influence of politics on higher education was described by past IAUP President Fernando León García, president of CETYS University, Mexico, as the ‘three Ps’ – ‘polarisation’, ‘populism’, and ‘politicisation’ – which make it increasingly difficult to persuade governments to increase funding for universities.

Last year, García told University World News this prompted an IAUP seminar focused on “fundraising and establishing partnerships with industry and philanthropists to fund R&D projects without depending on government support”.

Emerging opportunities

In Seoul this week discussions also turned from challenges to opportunities as university leaders heard from Minister of Science and Higher Education Sayasat Nurbek, of Kazakhstan, who described how Central Asia is capitalising on global shifts.

“Traditional academic mobility centres are now in turmoil,” Nurbek said. “There are ‘Make America Great Again’-type stories, visa and migration issues, and changing policies. For example, Canada lost 55% of its international students in the last two years,” Nurbek noted.

At the same time, Central Asia benefits from a strong demographic advantage – half of its population of two billion is under the age of 25, bucking the ageing trends in countries such as China, Japan, and Korea. These shifts are positioning Kazakhstan as an emerging “alternative” academic hub, combining innovation with international collaboration, he said.

A key part of Kazakhstan’s vision is embedding AI education across disciplines. Last month, the government declared AI a mandatory subject at every university. Starting this academic year, all 650,000 undergraduates must take AI courses – many developed in partnership with Nvidia, Huawei, and Google – with seed funding to support AI-based entrepreneurship for students.

“Maybe, just maybe, these long-lived dreams of any academician to change the millennia-old model of education, face-to-face, frontal, with the power of his new great tool – maybe it’s coming,” he said adding universities needed to be bold and push ahead.

“We're using our national curricula as a testing ground. We're bold to test new ideas, and the rationale is very simple – you can wait and see what happens, or you can run and be in the process, fail fast, make a lot of mistakes, but learn and gain that valuable experience.”

He asked rhetorically: “Should we go and be bold in this brave new world, try new things, try to do very unconventional things, or wait and see?”

Data from Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Science and Higher Education shows that 93 universities have integrated AI into their programmes, while 20 institutions launched 25 new AI-related educational tracks.

Integrating AI – a key task

AI integration is a central priority for the IAUP’s work under the leadership of its incumbent president, Shawn Chen, chairperson of Sias University, China.

In his welcome remarks to the conference, Chen highlighted that the IAUP, which “remains the world’s only international organisation led exclusively by university presidents”, is committed to helping institutions navigate change.

“IAUP is uniquely positioned to set standards, share best practices, and ensure that artificial intelligence serves civility, inclusivity, equity, and humanity,” Chen told university leaders.

He outlined the action required, including redesigning curricula for AI integration, empowering faculty to view AI “not as a threat but as a tool to enhance teaching,” and building alliances for ethical AI use.

Speaking to University World News, Chen described the conference as a “launchpad” for new initiatives to support members across all regions, including those affected by conflict or natural disasters.

A key initiative is advancing women’s leadership via a mentorship programme connecting emerging female leaders and individuals from under-represented regions with experienced university presidents and rectors.

“Ultimately, I aim to ensure that IAUP does not only serve as a network for discussion but also as a catalyst for measurable change,” Chen said.

Entering his second year as IAUP President, he said his priorities include deepening IAUP’s global reach through regional meetings in 2026 – Kuala Lumpur in January, Vilnius in April, Almaty in June, Adelaide in October, and Dhaka in November – while addressing region-specific challenges and creating pathways for more institutions to join the network.

Founded in 1964, IAUP comprises university presidents, rectors, and vice presidents from higher education institutions around the world. Today IAUP membership spans across more than 70 countries.

On the conference’s opening day, the IAUP welcomed nine new members from Kenya, Bangladesh, Gambia, Zimbabwe, the Philippines, Malaysia, and China, expanding the organisation’s global reach.

This article is published with the support of the International Association of University Presidents. University World News is solely responsible for the editorial content.