How Cal State Became Ground Zero for the Fight Over AI in Higher Education
Last February, California’s biggest public university system announced a first-of-its-kind deal with OpenAI to bring an educational version of its signature ChatGPT product to its 23 campuses.
A little over a year later, over 1,600 faculty, students and alumni from California State University (known as Cal State or CSU) have signed an online petition urging the school system’s chancellor not to renew the contract when it expires this summer, according to data shared by organizers. In total, more than 3,000 have backed the effort.
Critics of the $17 million deal argue that not only is the artificial intelligence tool unhelpful at best and actively detrimental for education at worst, but that the investment is financially irresponsible for a public university that is actively cutting staff and full departments and merging campuses in an effort to cut costs.
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