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The explosive growth of generative AI is leading colleges to offer students courses and degrees in AI “at speeds rarely seen in higher education” (The Wall Street Journal, subscription).

What’s going on: “The schools are eager to prove their relevance as a path to well-paying jobs. … The students believe the AI skills could make the difference between getting a job and not.”

• The University of Southern California started an “AI for business” major last year, Emory University now offers an AI minor, and Cornell University is designing an “AI and society” minor.
• Other schools, such as the Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey, will begin requiring students to take three AI-related courses, regardless of their majors.

Part of the job: At Handshake, a job-search engine for college students, the number of job descriptions mentioning AI tools has tripled over the past year—and employers have begun requiring job applicants to take “prompt-engineering assessments.”

A new expectation: College students are now expecting their coursework to prepare them for a workplace that uses generative AI.

• “Students and parents see that this is going to change the labor market in unprecedented ways,” one Cornell data sciences and operations professor told the Journal.