{"id":46432,"date":"2026-04-30T09:18:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T07:18:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/?p=46432"},"modified":"2026-04-30T09:18:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T07:18:15","slug":"can-universities-absorb-the-pressure-ai-and-the-changing-conditions-of-higher-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/subject\/higher-education\/can-universities-absorb-the-pressure-ai-and-the-changing-conditions-of-higher-education\/","title":{"rendered":"Can Universities absorb the pressure? AI and the changing conditions of Higher Education\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">by <strong>Somayeh\u00a0Aghnia<\/strong>, London School of Innovation (LSI), UK. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There is a familiar pattern in higher education.&nbsp;A new technology&nbsp;arrives. It is framed as transformative. It promises to reshape teaching and learning. And over time, it is absorbed into existing systems. The structure holds. The day-to-day reality changes only marginally.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We\u2019ve&nbsp;seen this with virtual learning environments, MOOCs, lecture capture. Each wave generated its own version of hype and anxiety. Each&nbsp;ultimately became&nbsp;part of the background.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It is tempting to assume this pattern will continue, but it may not. Not because AI is more powerful. But because the&nbsp;conditions under which it is arriving are fundamentally different.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Frictionless access to capability&nbsp;<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Previous&nbsp;waves of educational technology entered universities through institutional&nbsp;pathways.They&nbsp;arrived slowly, requiring procurement decisions, infrastructure investment, policy approval, and academic and organisational alignment. Crucially, students did not&nbsp;encounter&nbsp;them before universities chose to adopt them.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This gave universities time and control. They could delay adoption, shape implementation, or ignore the technology altogether. Change happened on institutional terms.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">AI does not follow this pattern. It has diffused at a speed and scale that is materially different, reaching widespread, usable adoption in a fraction of the time. And critically, it has done so through tools that are free or low-cost, requiring no institutional mediation and no infrastructural upgrade.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But the deeper shift is not speed alone. What is being accessed is as important if not more.&nbsp;Students are not just accessing information or tools. They are accessing&nbsp;capability,&nbsp;the ability to generate essays, solve problems, produce code, and create outputs that previously&nbsp;required&nbsp;significant effort, skill, or time.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">A system&nbsp;out of sync&nbsp;<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This creates a more fundamental tension. Universities&nbsp;operate&nbsp;at a particular&nbsp;tempo:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Programme and curriculum cycles measured in years&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Assessment models designed for stability and comparability&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Governance processes built on deliberation, committees, and consensus&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">AI&nbsp;operates&nbsp;at a different tempo:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Rapid iteration&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Continuous improvement&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Immediate availability at scale&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The result is a growing&nbsp;misalignment between the system (universities) and the disrupting force (AI), between institutional structures and lived practice.&nbsp;In my recent piece for Higher Education Policy Institute on&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.hepi.ac.uk\/2026\/04\/09\/weekend-reading-tempo-conflict-at-the-heart-of-ai-in-higher-education\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">tempo conflict<\/a>,&nbsp;I explored how universities are being pulled into a pace of change they did not design for. Universities risk losing their \u201corganising power over practice\u201d when real behaviour moves faster than institutional control.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The actual shifts&nbsp;<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At the surface level, much may appear unchanged: lectures still take place, assignments are still&nbsp;submitted, degrees are still awarded. But beneath that surface, more fundamental tensions begin to accumulate:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Assessment credibility&nbsp;is strained: what does it mean to&nbsp;demonstrate&nbsp;knowledge when capability is always available?&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Effort and authorship&nbsp;become harder to define&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Equity dynamics&nbsp;shift:&nbsp;access is widespread, but effective use is uneven&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Academic authority&nbsp;is challenged: if capability sits outside the institution, what&nbsp;remains&nbsp;inside it?&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They are gradual, cumulative, and often ambiguous tensions, but they are&nbsp;not insignificant. And they bring us back to the central question: whether adaptation can occur&nbsp;within existing models of higher education institutions,&nbsp;or whether those models begin to shift.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Absorption depends on certain conditions such as institutions can mediate access, that they can&nbsp;observe&nbsp;and regulate use, and that they can define how capability is&nbsp;demonstrated. These conditions are now under strain. Students have independent, continuous access to capability.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This is why some emerging models are not&nbsp;attempting&nbsp;to retrofit AI into existing&nbsp;systems, but&nbsp;instead are designing institutions around these conditions from the outset.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/lsi.ac.uk\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">London School of Innovation<\/a>&nbsp;is one such example, an AI-native institution designed with capability, assessment, and operations built for this environment rather than adapted to it. More on LSI\u2019s thinking can be found here:&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/lsi.ac.uk\/about-us?utm_source=chatgpt.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The case for an AI-native university<\/a>,&nbsp;which argues that the question is not how to adopt AI within existing models, but whether those models still hold under new conditions.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The future of HE is not predetermined&nbsp;<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There is a temptation to see this as inevitable. It&nbsp;isn\u2019t. Universities still have choices, but each path leads to a different kind of future.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>&#8211; Ignore the shift and drift under increasing pressure&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In this path, universities&nbsp;maintain&nbsp;existing models and assumptions, treating AI as peripheral or temporary. Over time, the gap between institutional design and lived practice widens. Assessment credibility becomes harder to defend, and student behaviour continues to evolve outside institutional visibility.&nbsp;<br>These universities do not disappear overnight, but they gradually&nbsp;lose authority and relevance.&nbsp;Their credentials may persist, but with increasing questions around what they&nbsp;actually signify. They become more dependent on legacy reputation than current coherence, slowly drifting toward diminished trust and value.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">&#8211; React with fragmented policies and inconsistent practices&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Here, universities respond, but without alignment. Policies are introduced, revised, and contested. Different departments, faculties, and institutions adopt divergent approaches. Some restrict, others integrate, most swing in between.&nbsp;<br>Over time, these institutions may continue to&nbsp;operate, but as increasingly fragmented systems. Internal coherence weakens, institutional identity becomes less clear, and the value proposition harder to articulate consistently.&nbsp;<br>Some will persist, often where geographic demand or structural factors sustain them, but in a more unstable and less legible form. Others may find themselves under increasing competitive pressure from institutions with stronger reputational legacies or from those that have more deliberately redesigned their models to align with these new conditions.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">&#8211; Redesign intentionally, rethinking core assumptions&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In this path, universities treat AI not as a tool to integrate, but as a condition to design around. Assessment shifts toward judgement, process, and context. Pedagogy evolves to emphasise interpretation, critique, and the use of capability rather than its substitution. The role of human judgement becomes more explicit, not less.&nbsp;<br>These institutions are more likely to&nbsp;redefine their relevance.&nbsp;They may start looking different,&nbsp;operating&nbsp;differently, and challenging existing norms, but they will&nbsp;retain&nbsp;(and potentially strengthen) their legitimacy by aligning with the realities of an AI-augmented world.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">AI in higher education may not arrive as a clean, designed transformation. It is more likely to&nbsp;emerge&nbsp;in a messy fashion through frictionless access to capability, a mismatch in tempo and continuous external pressure on institutional boundaries.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Not a revolution.&nbsp;But not a continuation either.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text is-stacked-on-mobile\" style=\"grid-template-columns:33% auto\"><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" src=\"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-46433 size-full\" srcset=\"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI.jpg 800w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-125x125.jpg 125w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-768x768.jpg 768w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-370x370.jpg 370w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-270x270.jpg 270w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-570x570.jpg 570w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-740x740.jpg 740w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-600x600.jpg 600w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-100x100.jpg 100w, https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/Somayeh-profile-pic-LSI-32x32.jpg 32w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/figure><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Somayeh&nbsp;Aghnia<\/strong>&nbsp;is Co-Founder of the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/lsi.ac.uk\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">London School of Innovation (LSI)<\/a>, where she works on new models of higher education for an AI-augmented society. She sits at the intersection of technology, education, and business, with a lens shaped by anthropology and philosophy. Her work focuses on how universities, and institutions more broadly, can imagine their futures in the AI-augmented world, and act with genuine agency and conscientiousness to navigate the path ahead, rather than simply surviving it.<br>LinkedIn:&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/linkedin.com\/in\/somayeh\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">linkedin.com\/in\/somayeh<\/a>&nbsp;<br>Email:&nbsp;<a href=\"mailto:somayeh@lsi.ac.uk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">somayeh@lsi.ac.uk<\/a>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Somayeh\u00a0Aghnia, London School of Innovation (LSI), UK. There is a familiar pattern in higher education.&nbsp;A new technology&nbsp;arrives. It is framed as transformative. It promises to reshape teaching and learning. And over time, it is absorbed into existing systems. The structure holds. The day-to-day reality changes only marginally.&nbsp; We\u2019ve&nbsp;seen this with virtual learning environments, MOOCs, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":46438,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[362,4,275],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence","category-featured-articles","category-higher-education"],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/files\/2026\/04\/width_1376.webp","author_info":{"display_name":"Shirin Izadpanah","author_link":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/author\/shirin-izadpanah\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46432"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46432\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46448,"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46432\/revisions\/46448"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media-and-learning.eu\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}