President Joseph E. Aoun spoke for around 22 minutes during his annual address to the faculty senate Sept. 17, discussing artificial intelligence, enrollment declines and other challenges currently facing Northeastern and the larger higher education community.
The speech marked the first time in nearly 19 months that Aoun has attended a faculty senate meeting. When asked about why Aoun did not speak to the faculty senate last academic year, Renata Nyul, vice president for communications, told The Huntington News that “The senate’s schedule and the president’s schedule simply didn’t line up.”
The meeting opened with an address from D’Amore-McKim School of Business professor and Chair of the Senate Agenda Committee, or SAC, Dee Spencer, who discussed SAC’s yearly goals, including to improve support for faculty and students and to “bring about meaningful change in areas that need improvement.” She emphasized that achieving these goals requires finding common ground with the administration, noting that both groups will either “swim together or sink separately.”
In his remarks, which fell toward the beginning of the two-hour meeting, Aoun drew attention to three “icebergs,” or challenges, that higher education institutions face nationwide.
“The university of the future is not going to be at all [like] the one we are seeing today,” Aoun told the more than 200 attendees, referring specifically to how developments in artificial intelligence, or AI, are reshaping higher education. “And we have to position ourselves to be at the forefront.”
The first challenge he addressed is the demographic cliff, a trend that occurs when fewer students graduate from high school and choose not to attend college. He previously acknowledged the demographic cliff in his February 2024 senate address.
“You know, in 2018, 69% of the students who finished high school were going to college. Now, it’s only 62%,” Aoun said at the September meeting.
The second “iceberg” is society’s lack of trust in higher education. Aoun said that, based on survey data, only “30% of the population has a favorable view of higher education institutions.”
“Higher education is facing a situation where society at large is questioning the value of higher education at all levels,” Aoun said.
The final “iceberg” is the impact AI is having on universities across the globe. Aoun emphasized the importance of staying ahead of the curve as emerging technology reshapes student learning experiences.
“AI is changing learning, is changing research, and essentially, we have to reaffirm the value of education at a time when knowledge is a commodity,” Aoun said.
He emphasized how AI has prompted the university to redesign its curriculum and research to embrace AI as a learning “companion” rather than a “substitute.”
Aoun has long advocated for integrating AI into university classrooms, complementing teaching skills that cannot be replicated by AI. In 2017, Aoun published a book titled “Robot-Proof: Higher Education in the Age of Artificial Intelligence,” in which he discusses how higher education ought to adapt amid the rise of AI.
He has also publicly discussed AI on numerous occasions, including at several university convocations and commencements. Under Aoun’s leadership, Northeastern has been regarded as a trailblazer among universities in implementing AI into its curriculum, and it recently launched a partnership with Anthropic to release Claude for Education, which provides students at partner universities full access to the chatbot as well as access to “learning mode.”
“We have the advantage of the first mover, but this advantage is disappearing,” Aoun said. “But also, every university is looking at AI as a tool, whereas here we can begin to look at AI as an entity.”
Northeastern’s lead on AI has allowed it to better integrate the technology into education than other universities, Aoun said. This strategy is aided by Northeastern’s signature co-op program, which gives students hands-on experiences that can’t be replicated by language learning models. During his speech, Aoun addressed how the co-op program will become more useful in the AI era.
“Co-op and experiential learning in the age of AI are more important than ever because they are allowing us to hone uniquely human skills,” Aoun said.
While Northeastern’s co-op program was established in 1909, Aoun also highlighted the more recent development of Northeastern expanding its campus network, which now comprises 14 campuses across three countries. Additionally, Northeastern’s N.U.in program offers first-year students the opportunity to study at a partner university abroad during their first semester; other programs allow first-year students to study at Northeastern’s Oakland, London or New York City campuses.
“The global university system, at all levels, has been an enormous boon for us, and frankly, it allowed us to weather many challenges and also take advantage of many opportunities,” Aoun said.
In his February 2024 senate address, Aoun focused on “sustainable growth” of the university as undergraduate applications surged and the global campus network continued to expand. In September 2022, a year after Northeastern acquired Mills College in Oakland, California, Aoun told faculty that having campuses beyond Boston allows for “student mobility,” which gives the university a “uniqueness.” In his most recent speech, he focused on “reinventing ourselves” as a university in the AI era.
“What carried us for hundreds of years forward will not carry us moving forward,” Aoun said. “And, that’s the new normal.”
Partly due to its global network, Northeastern has been able to offset some consequences of the Trump administration cracking down on international students and federal research funding, Aoun said. He specifically discussed how Northeastern’s presence in Dublin will allow the university to obtain European Science Foundation funding. While many universities face difficulties with recruiting international students, Aoun said Northeastern’s global network is providing other options for international students.
“At a time when things are becoming challenging, for instance, for international recruitment, the fact that we have these campuses in Canada, in London, in the U.K. is helping us in diversifying and providing other options too,” Aoun said.
Aoun did not take questions from faculty, although Provost Beth Winkelstein answered some after her introduction speech. In the meeting, multiple faculty members expressed frustration amid federal budget cuts and potential budget cuts at Northeastern.
The back half of the meeting centered around the university’s protection of international and transgender students amid shifting federal policies, though Aoun did not directly address how Northeastern is being impacted by President Donald Trump’s presidency.
At the end of his speech, Aoun expressed hope for the future and the upcoming generation, with whom he and the faculty will be able to work.
“We as teachers, as professors, as academicians, have the opportunity now to redefine ourselves, but also work with a generation that is frankly the first AI generation,” Aoun said, who left the meeting following his speech not fielding any questions from faculty members.
