Higher Education and Artificial Intelligence

Friday, January 31, 2025, 12:30–2:00pm

Social Science Research Building 122
[map]

At the beginning of the Autumn Quarter 2024, the University of Chicago launched a new generative AI application, Phoenix AI—essentially a local variant of GPT-4o. The decision to provide members of the university access to this customized platform was justified on the grounds that it would offer a more secure and accessible alternative to publicly available AI platforms. In the context of the university’s budgetary crisis, AI has also been touted as a way to achieve cost savings through automation of administrative and operational processes.

This panel, part of 3CT’s Corporate University project, aims to explore the increasing use of AI in higher education. What potential does generative AI offer to faculty and students in their pursuit of knowledge, and what are its costs? How does the turn to AI influence student learning outcomes and scholarly research agendas? And how might the use of AI in administrative functions reshape our community and its governance?

Please join us for a conversation with Andrew Eggers, Taylor Faires, and Anton Ford as they explore the implications that the proliferation of AI might have for the future of the university. 3CT fellow Daragh Grant will moderate, and lunch will be served.

Andrew Eggers is Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. His research focuses on electoral systems, corruption/accountability, the relationship between money and politics, and political development in the U.S., Britain, and France. He also has an interest in research methodology. From 2014 to 2020, he was a Professor in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford, a Professorial Fellow of Nuffield College, and Director of the Oxford QStep Centre. From 2011 to 2014 he was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Government at the London School of Economics.

Taylor Faires is Digital Scholarship Librarian at the University of Chicago, where she supports students and faculty in digital scholarship research and development. Faires holds a Master’s Degree in Information Science from the University of Michigan School of Information. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies from Barnard College.

Anton Ford is Associate Professor in Philosophy at the University of Chicago and a 3CT fellow. His primary research and teaching interests are in Practical Philosophy, understood broadly to include Action Theory, Ethics, and Political Philosophy. Figures of special interest include Anscombe, Aristotle and Marx.

Daragh Grant is an Assistant Senior Instructional Professor in Social Sciences Division and the College, Co-Chair of the Classics of Social and Political Thought core sequence, and a 3CT fellow. His intellectual interests include the history of colonialism and empire, the history of slavery, and the development of understandings of sovereignty and subjecthood from the sixteenth century to the present.

This event is free and open to the public, and registration is recommended. Please email us at ccct@uchicago.edu if you require any accommodations to enable your full participation.