College Is Coming Apart
This article explores the conflicting role of AI in American higher education, where it is simultaneously viewed as a threat to academic integrity and a vital tool for scientific research. The author argues that these opposing forces are causing a fundamental breakdown in the traditional university model.
Why it matters
It reflects the broader societal struggle to adapt institutional structures to the rapid and disruptive integration of generative AI.
Successive, overlapping crises reveal that American higher education makes no sense.
Illustration by The Atlantic. Sources: Getty. September 17, 2026, 8 AM ET Share Save AI arrived on campus as a crisis but has since become banal. Students can now do basically all their schoolwork automatically with AI—answering scientific problem sets, writing computer code, and drafting essays. Professors like me have no idea whether we are really teaching or just LARPing for students who are also pretending to occupy their role. Worse, some of us are offloading the drudgery of writing recommendation letters , grant proposals , and even scientific papers to AI.
Get smarter about the news
Sign up free for a feed built around what you actually care about, Dive Deeper research on any story, and the full text of every article.
Create free accountAlready have an account? Sign in