As companies integrate artificial intelligence into their workforces, college graduates in nearly every industry may need experience using AI tools to secure a job.
But educators and career experts say that if universities want to best prepare students for the changing landscape, they need to help students build technical AI skills while continuing to teach them the soft skills like critical thinking, problem-solving, and creativity needed to use AI competently, ethically, and effectively.
“If the purpose of training (in higher education) is to train kids to do the jobs of today and tomorrow, why train kids with yesterday’s skills?” said Jeff Crews, an adjunct professor of cybersecurity at North Carolina State University.
The job market has been tough for young workers in recent years. According to the New York Fed, the unemployment rate for new graduates (defined as workers ages 22 to 27 with a bachelor’s degree or higher) was 5.6% in December, far higher than the 3.1% unemployment rate for all college graduates.
According to a 2025 study by labor research firm Rebellio Lab, the number of entry-level job openings has decreased by about 35% since January 2023, mainly due to the impact of AI. A November study from Stanford University similarly found that early-career talent in the jobs most exposed to AI, such as software engineers and customer service representatives, declined by 16% between 2022 and 2025.
There’s some good news too. Employers expect a 5.6% increase in new hires this spring, according to April survey data from the National Association of College and Employers, a professional organization. The study also found that 35% of entry-level jobs require AI skills, but 52% of employers surveyed said AI has not reduced the need for tasks for entry-level employees. Most employers (55%) report plans to retain new hires this spring, and the remaining 34% plan to increase hiring, according to the NACE report.
All things considered, Crume and other experts say it’s imperative that universities support the education of students using AI tools, and graduating seniors agree. According to Handshake’s 2026 Graduation Report, a career networking site for college students, the majority (58%) of college seniors surveyed said they need a deeper understanding of AI to be successful. However, only 27% of students say AI is meaningfully integrated into their academic program.
Some schools are adding AI courses and AI-specific degrees. In 2018, Carnegie Mellon University became the first US school to offer a Bachelor of Science degree in artificial intelligence, and at least a dozen schools have since followed suit.
But while having technical expertise in AI may be a lucrative specialty for now, educators and career experts stress that the workforce of the future will still need a well-rounded education that emphasizes human-centered soft skills, and some educational institutions may still have some catching up to do.
The role of universities in the AI economy
At the organizational level, AI adoption varies widely. Some schools have banned the use of generative AI, a tool that uses machine learning to create new content. Other universities, such as Ohio State University and Purdue University, require a basic level of AI competency for graduation and require coursework or integration into existing classes to help students meet that standard.
According to an October poll by the Lumina Foundation, a higher education charity, more than half of university students across the country surveyed said their institution either discourages the use of AI or bans it completely. Still, the survey found that 57% of respondents said they use AI at least once a week, with the most common purposes being to save time or understand complex content.
According to the 2025 Global Survey by the Council for Digital Education, a group of academic institutions that work together to shape and advance technology in higher education, 61% of faculty members surveyed said they had used AI in their teaching, but 88% of that group said they had used it minimally or moderately. According to DEC, educators are the most commonly used AI users.
Creation of teaching materials Support for office work Utilization of AI in classes and guidance on evaluation
When GenAI hit the market, universities immediately took notice, said Alondra Nelson, a professor at the Institute for Advanced Study and founder of the center’s Science, Technology and Social Value Lab. Many schools offer AI coursework, if not full-fledged degree programs. According to market research firm Validated Insights, as of early 2025, 44% of higher education institutions are offering AI coursework.
“It was clear from very early on that university boards were directing deans, provosts and provosts to have an AI strategy,” Nelson says.
Some schools are encouraging the use of AI with the understanding that its capabilities should not be limited to technical skills. For example, Ohio State University will roll out its AI Fluency initiative in fall 2025, which includes a required first-year course on generative AI, technical training on AI tools, and education on the ethical and safe use of tools, the school said in an announcement.
“The most important skill” in the AI era
However, career experts agree that technical knowledge of AI, such as how to prompt large-scale language models or how to create AI-powered chatbots, is not enough. Crume and other experts say soft skills remain important for entry-level workers to find jobs.
In NACE’s 2026 study, employers rated soft skills such as communication, teamwork, and critical thinking as more important than AI skills. However, only about half of the employers surveyed reported that their new graduates were very or very skilled at communicating and critical thinking. However, most employers (75%) said that graduates are very or very skilled at teamwork.
In his “limited experience,” Crum says schools can do more to ensure students have the soft skills they need to succeed in the workplace and in everyday life. Making humanities subjects, such as history and languages, where students develop critical thinking skills, relevant and appealing to students is a challenge that has existed for generations, he says.
Crume’s students often go on to work in research and development or IT roles in organizations that use AI after graduation, but he said education in the humanities and social sciences is still needed. That’s because “we need AI that is human-centered and responsive to what we want,” he says.
In that vein, he also calls critical thinking “the most important skill” in the AI era.
Mark Watkins, assistant director of academic innovation and director of the AI Institute for Teachers at the University of Mississippi, agrees. “When you look at the actual workforce and think about what students need, it’s really critical thinking. It’s communication,” he says.
While AI technology could eliminate many roles and tasks currently performed by workers, it will also create new jobs, Klum said. At work and at home, employees will continue to need critical thinking skills to evaluate information, make smart decisions, and solve complex problems.
“What a university education needs to do…is help people learn how to practice that kind of critical thinking, which is important and central to the solutions to many social problems that we think of as solely technical,” Nelson says.
Employers are increasingly looking for technical skills in AI and related software in hiring, but they’re still looking for workers who are highly competent in soft skills, said Christine Cruzvergara, chief education strategy officer at Handshake.
“Even with the emergence of AI literacy and AI skills, the skills most commonly named in any job description remain core and enduring skills, such as communication, conflict management, teamwork, and critical thinking,” she says.
How educational institutions can improve their AI approaches
While implementing AI is no small or uniform challenge for universities, experts generally agree that this technology cannot be ignored. Even students who land jobs that don’t rely heavily on AI will still need to interact with the technology in some way, Nelson said, such as working with an AI customer service agent or deciphering whether an image is real or computer-generated.
Cruzvergara said simply keeping up with developments in AI is one of the challenges facing institutions.
“The development of AI and what it can do is progressing. It’s changing literally every week, but higher education wasn’t built with that level of speed in mind,” she says.
In response, universities should invest in providing students access to AI tools, including subscriptions to premium chatbots, Cruzvergara and Watkins say.
It’s one thing to allow students to use AI software like Claude or ChatGPT to enhance their learning. But inequalities can arise if students who can afford a premium subscription have an advantage over those who only have access to the free model, Watkins said.
Paid subscriptions to GenAI programs can generally offer faster responses and greater privacy, which can make the difference in whether students use the tool or not, Watkins said.
In addition, institutions and educators need to effectively communicate standards for the use of AI so that students clearly understand when it is appropriate to use the tool and where it falls short, experts say.
AI can help solve problems, but machines won’t be much help unless they understand what’s really important to the person asking the question and their motivations, said Sheryl Strauss Einhorn, founder of decision science company Decisive and adjunct professor at Cornell University’s S.C. Johnson School of Business. She said she aims to show students the “enormous knowledge” and capabilities that AI tools have, while also emphasizing the importance of human input.
“Our decisions are how we get to our future, and AI can only tell us the answers of others,” she says.
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