Leuphana prepares its students for working with artificial intelligence

There is still a lack of concepts and training opportunities for the legally compliant use of AI as a tool in studies, teaching and examinations, as well as a lack of provision of and access to tried-and-tested AI applications. LAICA aims to change this: on the one hand, students will be able to acquire the necessary AI skills in future, and on the other hand, the potential of AI as a tool for university education will be made accessible.

Leuphana initially plans to conduct systematic surveys of students' needs and skills. These will form the basis for comprehensively embedding basic AI education in all phases of study. So far, AI has mostly only been addressed in individual subjects, and there has been no comprehensive examination of the multitude of relevant social and ethical perspectives.
The plan is to integrate a newly developed basic module, ‘AI Literacy,’ into the curriculum of the interdisciplinary Leuphana semester, which is compulsory for all Bachelor's students. In addition, the reflective and legally compliant use of AI as a tool for teaching, learning and testing, as well as for student support and feedback, will be promoted. To this end, technical, ethical, social, ecological and economic aspects of AI use will be examined. Students will thus gain a comprehensive overview of the potential and challenges of AI applications.

The unique study model at Leuphana College allows for the introduction of a new minor in Artificial Intelligence. This means that AI can be studied separately from pure computer science courses. Students from all faculties will be able to choose this minor in the future. They will be equipped to understand the technical, organisational and social implications of intelligent systems and put this knowledge into practice. AI will also be integrated as a subject and tool in further stages of study, such as master's and doctoral programmes.

Leuphana is also involved in a joint project in Lower Saxony. The ‘Campus in Transition’ (CiT) project creates a unique collaboration between Leuphana University Lüneburg, the Technical University of Braunschweig and the Georg August University of Göttingen. The three universities are working together to develop cooperative teaching architectures and renew their institutional structures. The results will benefit all universities in Lower Saxony, increasing their effectiveness and resilience. This project is also funded by the Foundation for Innovation in Higher Education with a million-euro grant.