Google and Rutgers Business School Team Up to Infuse AI Into Curriculum
Credit: Michael Nigro / Pacific Press / LightRocket / Getty Images- Rutgers Business School announced a new partnership with Google to boost AI efforts.
- The entire institution is also revamping its curriculum to include AI instruction.
- That will include a focus on ethics and practical applications.
- A majority of business schools now offer AI instruction, according to recent GMAC research.
A major business school and a tech giant are joining forces to help future leaders embrace artificial intelligence (AI).
Google and Rutgers Business School announced a new partnership to provide AI tools to students and faculty. Google’s suite of AI tools, including its own Gemini, Meta’s Llama, and Anthropic’s Claude, will be available through a single tool at Rutgers Business School.
That new partnership comes as Rutgers overhauls its curriculum to focus on AI, according to a Rutgers press release. Both graduate and undergraduate courses are being infused with AI fundamentals.
That revamped curriculum will include a focus on AI use cases and overviews of how it’s being used in areas like marketing, accounting, and the supply chain. Rutgers is also rolling out new degrees and concentrations, including a master of business administration (MBA) concentration in AI.
Rutgers Business School Dean Lei Lei said in the release that students need to be prepared for a rapidly shifting, AI-focused landscape as they head into the job market.
“The fast advancement of technologies has fundamentally shifted the landscape of the business world and is making a transformative impact across industries,” Lei said in the release. “As a large public business school, our ambition is to prepare graduates with the skills and talent most in demand by industry.”
Preparing graduates means “revamping the learning experience, creating innovative and disruptive content, to ensure that our students gain a strong understanding of the emerging technologies, including AI, that companies are eager to use,” Lei said.
Rutgers’ AI-focused curriculum will also have a heavy focus on ethics — a rapidly developing area as AI expands to every corner of the business and education landscapes.
“Our collaboration with Rutgers, the first public business school to adopt Gemini, prioritizes student data privacy and ethical considerations, allowing educators to confidently bring cutting-edge AI into their classrooms,” Google Public Sector Go-to-Market Vice President Brent Mitchell said in the release.
The new focus on AI schoolwide at Rutgers comes after the university launched a master of accountancy program designated in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) with a major emphasis on AI.
Business Schools Go All in on AI
Rutgers is the latest school to embrace AI amid a sea change in business education.
ChatGPT recently turned 2 years old, and, in the time since its launch, new AI products have rolled out and brought seismic shifts to the business world. The Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) said in a recent press release that most business programs now have AI instruction in their curricula.
“There is no doubt that business schools have taken it up a notch in responding to market imperatives in technological advancements, without losing sight of delivering core competencies like strategic thinking and problem-solving,” GMAC CEO Joy Jones said in that release.
“This year’s soaring applications to graduate business programs proves that business schools are on the right track meeting student demands head on, helping graduates upskill with employers’ most coveted capabilities in an AI-affected world.”
A previous GMAC survey found that only 22% of business schools hadn’t integrated AI into student learning.
Many business schools’ approaches to AI in the classroom mirror that of Rutgers. American University’s Kogod School of Business is another example of a business school infusing AI throughout its curriculum.
Kogod in 2024 rolled out 20 new and updated courses as a bid to integrate AI in its student experience.
“Artificial intelligence is here to stay, and business students need to be prepared to utilize applications for generative AI on day one of their future jobs,” Kogod Dean David Marchick said at the time.
A focus on ethics — such as in Rutgers’ doubling down on AI — is also a common theme at top business schools. The University of Virginia Darden School of Business recently launched an AI ethics institute to boost research and help businesses evaluate their use of artificial intelligence.
AI skills are increasingly important to both students and employers, although employers said in a previous GMAC study that human skills like strategic thinking will continue to be key for business school graduates over the next five years.