For the AV/IT team at Texas A&M, creating a templatized approach to AV wasn't just about picking the right hardware; it was about building an ecosystem.

The Future Universities Alliance, spearheaded by Noah Pickus at Duke, is designed to build a global network for higher education innovation. By intentionally omitting the word "Duke" from its name, the alliance aims to foster an open, pluralistic community in which universities worldwide can participate as equals. The initiative seeks to serve as a platform for institutions to share ideas, develop new curricula, and address significant challenges in education, drawing inspiration from models such as Minerva University and Olin College of Engineering.

A central focus of the University of Nebraska's new AI Institute is the ethical and human-centered development of AI. Leadership emphasizes the importance of addressing AI's societal challenges and threats, such as environmental impacts and intellectual development, by modeling responsible practices. The institute's mission is to ensure that AI serves the public good through its teaching, research and partnerships, and to promote critical AI literacy throughout the university and beyond.

AI is changing the nature of authority in higher education, writes Ake Elden, a behavioral scientist at NLA University College in Norway. Elden argues that academic expertise has traditionally involved personal judgment and risk-taking, but that AI tools now enable faculty and administrators to produce "synthetic authority" that meets institutional demands without deep engagement. "The resulting documents look authoritative, but their authority derives from stylistic alignment rather than epistemic depth," Elden writes. "The expert becomes a relay point through which institutional legitimacy flows, rather than a source from which it originates."