With AI the norm, local professor explores what it means to get an education

College students across the state have just wrapped up the school year. It was the third school year where access to generative AI was commonplace. Artificial intelligence has changed how many students – and their professors – look at getting an education. Chris Wells is chair of the Environmental Studies department at Macalester College. Like most other educators over the past few years, he’s constantly navigating his students' relationships with AI and the classroom. He admits like most educators, he’s still figuring it out. He writes a newsletter about what AI means for college teaching called Teaching Upside Down.Wells joined MPR News host Nina Moini to talk about the shifts he’s noticed in the classroom, how he’s changed assignments with AI in mind and how he’s rethinking what getting an education means when generative AI can accomplish so much.