The private Catholic institution Mount St. Joseph University is the latest Cincinnati-area college to add artificial intelligence to its selection of degree offerings.
On Thursday, the university announced the launch of its new Bachelor of Science in Artificial Intelligence and an Artificial Intelligence minor within its Department of Computer Science & Mathematics. The university also added that it will expand AI education across the school's other programs.
In the past few years, several other area colleges, including the University of Cincinnati, Miami University, Xavier University, and Northern Kentucky University, have launched AI programs of their own.
UC started its artificial intelligence master's degree program through its College of Engineering and Applied Science about eight years ago, predating OpenAI's chatbot, ChatGPT, by several years. Since then, the school has added an AI associate degree at its Blue Ash campus, along with training courses and a certificate at its Lindner College of Business.
Miami added a Bachelor of Science in Artificial Intelligence at its College of Engineering and Computing in Oct. to prepare students for careers in a variety of fields.
Xavier launched a four-year AI degree program last year as part of a broad expansion of its academic offerings.
NKU began welcoming its students from all areas of study into its AI minor in fall 2024, making it the first university in Kentucky to offer such a minor. It has also reworked its Bachelor of Science in Applied Software Engineering into a new AI-Enabled Software Engineering degree program.
Rebecca Allen, Chair of Computer Science and Mathematics at Mount St. Joseph, says colleges are adding AI programs to meet the demands of students who want to learn to use the technology to make them more competitive in the job market.
"We do have to be responsible in the students we're sending out into the marketplace," Allen tells WVXU. "There's a real wage premium for students who are able to work in various fields, management, accounting, marketing, and use AI."
On top of learning computer science basics and how to create AI tools, another main focus of Mount St. Joseph's program will be using AI ethically. Allen adds that the rapid growth of AI and how it's been used in certain situations have made some people fearful and skeptical of the technology. She wants her students to understand all the potential positives and negatives of AI and play a role in making a tool for good.
"If something has the potential to be really bad, and/or it did really bad things, we really have to understand it to prevent it, to regulate it, to advocate for better outcomes in the future. If we're just sticking our heads in the sand because we don't like it, I don't think we're doing ourselves or society a service. We really need to understand it," Allen says.
Students can begin enrolling in the program this coming fall.
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