Sunday morning. Birds chirping outside the grimy window. Head feels like a cement mixer full of angry bees. Naturally, the first thing I lay my bleary eyes on is some goddamn report about universities needing to get their asses in gear about AI. Universities Must Act Now To Close The AI Readiness Gap. Jesus. Talk about stating the obvious while the whole ship’s sinking. Need a drink already. Where’s that bottle? Ah, yes. Sweet relief.
So, Adobe, those wizards who charge you a king’s ransom to fiddle with photos, did a study. Found out – hold onto your hats, folks – that college kids are using AI. Ninety percent of ’em. Over half use it weekly. Shocker. Like finding out dogs bark or politicians lie. They’re using it for “summarizing dense reading” and “generating study guides.” Translation: they’re using it to avoid the soul-crushing boredom of wading through unreadable academic garbage written by professors who probably haven’t had a decent screw or a stiff drink in decades. Can’t blame the kids. It’s like giving a thirsty man a map to the brewery. Of course he’s gonna use it.
But here’s the rub, the part that makes you want to pour another one: the institutions, the hallowed halls of higher learning, are sitting around with their thumbs up their collective asses. While 90% of the students are plugging prompts into some AI like it’s a digital vending machine for essays, fewer than 40% of these universities have bothered to cobble together a policy on the stuff. And get this – most of those policies are just about catching cheaters. Plagiarism. Like that’s the biggest fucking worry when the robots are practically tucking the kids into bed at night.
They call it an “AI Readiness Gap.” Sounds fancy. Sounds urgent. Sounds like something a consultant cooked up to scare administrators into buying more software or hiring more overpaid “thought leaders.” What it really means is the professors and the deans are like dinosaurs watching the meteor streak across the sky, wondering if it’ll pair well with their Chardonnay.
This fella, Joe Sabado, has apparently made a hobby out of collecting these pathetic policy documents. Over 500 of ’em. He’s got categories showing who wrote the policy (usually some lawyer or IT drone who wouldn’t know a student if one bit him on the ass), how deep it goes (usually about as deep as a puddle of spilled beer), and whether they’re thinking beyond catching little Johnny Cribsheet. Most aren’t. Some only mention ChatGPT, like that’s the only game in town. These kids are already using stuff that acts on its own, “agentic AI,” they call it. Tools that probably know more about the students’ hangovers than their own guidance counselors. And the universities? Still stuck arguing about split infinitives and tenure.
Then the article starts throwing around terms like “reflexive intelligence.” Oh, brother. Pass the bottle. It means the “institutional ability to pause, examine assumptions, and act with intention.” In plain English: stop being bureaucratic morons for five goddamn minutes and figure out what the hell is going on. Align AI strategy with mission, not just compliance. Yeah, good luck with that. These places move slower than molasses in January, uphill, carrying a piano. Their “mission” usually involves fundraising and maintaining the illusion of prestige, not preparing kids for a world that’s changing faster than a cheap suit in the rain.
Now, here’s a laugh riot: the Adobe study claims students using AI weekly are 17% less likely to experience academic stress. No shit, Sherlock. If you had a magic box that did half your homework, wouldn’t you be less stressed? You’d have more time for important things, like drinking, chasing skirts, or staring blankly at the ceiling contemplating the void. The report acts like this is some profound insight into student wellness. It’s not wellness, it’s outsourcing. The kids are stressed because they’re buried under mountains of pointless busywork. AI is just a shovel. A smart shovel, maybe, but still a shovel. It helps them dig out, but are they learning anything besides how to operate the shovel?
The author, some academic type no doubt, then lays out four “immediate actions” for these universities. Like a goddamn prescription.
It all sounds so reasonable, so actionable. Like a self-help book for clueless administrators. But it misses the beautiful, messy truth of it all. These kids aren’t “innovating” because they’re visionary geniuses. They’re using AI because it’s easy. Because the system often rewards shortcuts over genuine understanding. Because maybe, just maybe, a lot of what passes for “learning” in these expensive institutions isn’t worth the effort anymore. The professors drone on, recycling notes from 1998, while the students are living in 2025, plugged into machines that can access more information in a second than that professor learned in his entire miserable life.
This isn’t just about a “readiness gap.” It’s about relevance. Are these universities teaching kids how to think, how to question, how to create something new? Or are they just teaching them how to jump through hoops, hoops that are rapidly becoming obsolete? AI can jump through hoops like nobody’s business. It can summarize, generate text, even code. What it can’t do is feel the sting of rejection, the thrill of a genuine breakthrough after weeks of banging your head against the wall. It can’t get drunk and write a bad poem that somehow feels more real than anything it could ever generate. It doesn’t understand despair, or joy, or the exquisite agony of a three-day bender.
That’s the human part. The messy, unpredictable, often stupid, sometimes brilliant part. And that’s what these institutions should be fostering. Not just AI literacy, but human literacy. Resilience. Creativity. The ability to deal with ambiguity and failure. The guts to say something original, even if it’s wrong.
Instead, they’re fumbling with policies, worried about plagiarism while the whole definition of authorship is going up in smoke. They’re trying to bolt AI onto a system that was already creaking under its own weight. It’s like trying to put a jet engine on a horse-drawn carriage. You’re not gonna get a faster carriage; you’re gonna get horse pâté all over the damn road.
The article ends by saying, “Students are already building the future. It’s time for institutions to catch up.” Cute. But the kids aren’t building the future; they’re just using the tools handed to them, mostly to make their lives easier in the present. The real future is being built by the guys designing these AI systems, the ones figuring out how to make them smarter, faster, more capable of doing things we thought only humans could do. And the universities? They’re not even in the race. They’re standing by the track, holding rulebooks written for a different sport entirely, wondering why nobody’s asking for their autograph.
So yeah, universities need to “act now.” They needed to act yesterday. They needed to act ten years ago. But they won’t. Not really. They’ll form committees, issue reports, tweak syllabi, buy some new software, and declare victory. Meanwhile, the world will keep spinning, the tech will keep accelerating, and the gap will keep widening. Until one day, maybe, people will realize that paying a fortune to sit in a lecture hall learning stuff an AI could teach you better and faster is just plain dumb.
Makes me thirsty just thinking about it. The absurdity of it all. These eggheads in their ivory towers, debating policies while the ground crumbles beneath them. Trying to regulate a tidal wave with a strongly worded memo. Good luck, fellas. You’re gonna need it. Me? I know how to handle a rising tide. Pour another drink.
Alright, this bottle’s looking awfully empty. Time for a refill, or maybe just oblivion.
Chinaski out. Keep pouring.
Source: Universities Must Act Now To Close The AI Readiness Gap