Well before “AI” had entered the lexicon of evening newscasters, the university model of higher-education was in trouble. Between 2010 and 2022 — the year ChatGPT came out — university enrollment dropped nearly 15 percent throughout the US. State funding cuts pushed already exorbitant tuition costs onto even more students, forcing many to ask whether a college education was even worth the staggering investment.
And when AI chatbots did hit the scene, they turned a lousy situation into a full blown nightmare, with fresh college graduates discovering in real time that their degrees are almost useless in one of the worst job markets in recent history.
Alina McMahon, a recent University of Pittsburgh graduate interviewed by New York Magazine, describes a job market lacking even the most basic opportunities. After applying to around 150 full-time jobs, McMahon’s only feedback from hiring managers was that roles were being cut.
“I know those are kind of rookie numbers in this environment,“ she told the magazine. “It’s very discouraging.”
According to the most recent data released by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in mid-December, the unemployment rate for recent college grads stands at 5.8 percent, a full 1.7 percent higher than the average across all workers. Recent college grads are also experiencing an unemployment rate almost double the average for all college grads, which stands at 2.9 percent.
That comes as typical on-ramps like internships are being gutted by major companies. As the former head of early career programs at Raymond James Financial, Simon Kho told NY Mag, AI has completely upended the financial calculus around hiring and training young talent. Breaking it down to brass tacks, Kho said it took around 18 months for fresh college grads to “pay off” on the time and resources required to train them.
At around that point, “they get fidgety,” and begin searching for the next step in their career. “So you can see the challenges from an HR standpoint,” Kho explained, which leads to uncomfortable questions: “‘Where are we getting value? Will AI solve this for us?’”
All of this is having the effect of destroying the perceived “return on investment” for college enrollment, which in turn is leading to shrinking class sizes, especially in tech-focused degrees like computer science. Simply put, if college grads don’t have internship experience by the time they leave, they’re much less likely to land a career in their chosen field — but companies are increasingly hesitant to take on the burden.
As Ryan Craig, author of the book “Apprentice Nation,“ explained to NY Mag, “colleges and universities face an existential issue before them.”
“They need to figure out how to integrate relevant, in-field, and hopefully paid work experience for every student, and hopefully multiple experiences before they graduate,” he warned.
More on AI: AI Is Causing Cultural Stagnation, Researchers Find
The post It’s Starting to Look Like AI Has Killed the Entire Model of College appeared first on Futurism.
