NKU is bringing responsible AI to students and the community in so many ways.
Here is how we are bringing AI to the COI:
The
AI Navigo Scholars program, now is its third year, brings 9th and 10th graders to Griffin Hall after school to get hands-on experience with AI tools that can help them academically, engage with the robots in the Duke Energy Innovation Lab, and do AI projects that they present to their families at a culminating celebration.
NKU’s new
AI Literacy course (INF 125) is a general education course accessible to all students. It is a model for the AI literacy course of the WeLead CS rural tech academy in Kentucky, and next year we expect it to be available as a School Based Scholars course.
The
Applied AI Minor is open to students who are seeking to complement their majors with “AI-ready” skills and knowledge, increasing their chances of success when they graduate into an AI-disrupted job market.
On the technical side, the new
BS in AI-Enabled Software Engineering (reworked from the former BS in Applied Software Engineering) produces software professionals who are many times more productive, since from the beginning they have mastered working with AI agents, as industry is now expecting.
This fall the
AI Native Studio project course is putting teams of students on real-world AI projects for companies and non-profits, and the course is led not by traditional professors but by faculty and consultants with AI experience in industry. This is the first phase in the launch of NKU’s new AI Agency, so stay tuned for more on that.
Finally, the
Rieveschl Born Before AI lecture series for retirees (“post-career individuals”) returns to the Digitorium in Griffin Hall for a third season this April, bringing top speakers on AI as well as a hands-on session to those who are eager to keep up to date on how AI is changing our world.
Because these AI programs originate in NKU’s interdisciplinary College of Informatics, their strength is that they do not approach AI as computer science or mere “tech”. The connection to media and communication is essential, and that is burned into these programs. And indeed most of these programs connect to colleges across campus, such as Education, Arts & Sciences, and Business.
Of course, AI at NKU is now touching nearly every major and indeed nearly every class. But please know, we are not uncritical geeky AI “fans”.
Our goal is to have our students approach it with their eyes open, and be fully versed in its broader societal, ethical, psychological, environment implications, even as they master the skills to be competitive in the workforce.
