A new $10 million provost-funded curriculum innovation initiative will help academic departments at Stanford rethink their undergraduate majors for the artificial intelligence age – reimagining everything from introductory courses to capstone experiences, and untangling the knotty question: What should students learn, demonstrate, and do on their own when AI tools can write, code, and create at their behest?

As colleges and universities nationwide race to weave AI into their classrooms, the multiyear initiative aims to help academic departments consider effective ways to build AI use and critical thinking with AI into their majors.

The initiative will also help departments determine when and how AI should be excluded from a course or major and identify what students should do without the aid of a chatbot.

“Stanford has long been at the frontier of artificial intelligence, and that comes with a responsibility to lead in how we educate,” said Provost Jenny Martinez. “There isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution for teaching in the age of AI, so we want to empower experimentation and encourage faculty to share what they learn. These grants are an opportunity for faculty to come together at the department or program level and comprehensively think about how their curricula might evolve.”

Building AI-aware curricula across majors and programs

Beginning in winter quarter 2027, academic departments and programs that offer undergraduate majors can apply for one- to two-year grants of up to $750,000 to reimagine their academic offerings for the AI era. The curriculum innovation effort will be facilitated and managed by the Office of the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education (VPUE) and the AI Meets Education at Stanford (AIMES) initiative leadership in collaboration with the Stanford Accelerator for Learning.

AIMES co-leads Michele Elam and Cassandra Volpe Horii explained that departments selected to take part will commit to building “coherent and comprehensive AI-aware curricula across their majors and programs.” The objective: Ensure Stanford students graduate with the competencies and confidence to lead, contribute, and make values-based decisions in a world where AI has become ubiquitous in society and across professions.

Elam, the William Robertson Coe Professor of the Humanities in the English Department and senior associate vice provost for undergraduate education, said, “This exciting initiative is especially distinctive in that it directly engages AI and curricula at the department-wide level, offering faculty a unique opportunity to consider how AI might or should shape their disciplines, and to ask: What does AI mean for our field? How should it influence our norms, ethics, policies, and educational priorities? And how might these conversations inform not only individual courses but, even more transformationally, the design of our major?”

This fall, initiative leaders will ask department chairs and directors of undergraduate studies to consider how AI could reshape an entire major – not just a single class. Horii explained that could mean redesigning courses or rethinking the progression from introductory coursework to a senior capstone.

“AI requires more than isolated course-level changes,” Horii said. “This new effort addresses Stanford’s vital need for sustained dialogue within and across departments, broad participation, and support for multiyear curricular change that can evolve alongside the technology.”

Elam said the curriculum innovation initiative supports multiple perspectives on AI. Departments may emphasize teaching and assessment strategies that do not rely on AI – such as in-class learning activities and oral exams – as well as discipline-appropriate integration of AI into learning and teaching.

The funding initiative builds upon the insights and recommendations of the AI at Stanford Advisory Committee report and a recent AIMES publication on progress and trends, which documented challenges in the AI space and called for new forms of campus engagement in an era of fast-paced change. Meanwhile, HAI’s AI Index shows the growing influence of AI across job sectors and society more broadly, and the Accelerator for Learning’s work on student assessments offers more insight into what skills should be assessed and how.

Stanford instructors, working individually and in small groups, have already been drawing upon AI in Teaching and Learning Seed Grants, which were announced in April this year, to test AI-related teaching changes. Their approaches include both integrating AI into learning and engaging students without AI tools, with lessons shared across disciplines through campus initiatives and events.

“With AI seed grants underway, curricular work on AI at the department and program level remains an urgent need,” said Elam. “This new initiative offers a chance to build shared investment in our educational mission – not only by engaging AI as both a tool and a subject of critical inquiry, but, crucially, by engaging with one another. The expectation is that these internal discussions will catalyze projects that ultimately have broad consequential impact – for the departments, across the Stanford community, and potentially for the disciplines themselves.”

A new era of teaching and learning

Horii said academic departments will be encouraged to “dream big” about curricular possibilities while also grounding changes in the needs and norms of their fields. Initiative leaders and staff will help departments map AI-related learning outcomes across their majors – including different stances toward and approaches to the technology – and across courses, pathways, and sequences.

“As with past seed grants for undergraduate curriculum transformation under VPUE’s Leveling the Learning Landscape initiative, and the newer AI seed grants launched in spring, these efforts spark important sharing of ideas and discoveries among and across disciplines,” Horii added. “We are excited to build in opportunities that make it both easy and rewarding to learn more about colleagues’ approaches and make progress together.”

Rather than a single annual call for proposals, departments can apply quarterly, and funding will be awarded on a rolling basis. Individual departmental awards are expected to range from $250,000 to $750,000 depending on the scale of reform.

With $10 million in funding to the program overall, the initiative estimates collaboration with approximately 15 academic departments, with work beginning in 2026-27 and concluding by 2028-29.

VPUE will provide ongoing tools and structured support, including guidance from the Center for Teaching and Learning and Stanford’s PACE (Promoting Academic Communities and Engagement) team. Funding is intended to meet concrete departmental needs, while VPUE support will help departments plan, implement, and optimize their work.

Jay Hamilton, the Freeman-Thornton Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education and Hearst Professor of Communication, called the initiative an “extraordinary investment” in a new era of teaching and learning.

“Students will graduate into a world where AI tools are everywhere, so they need to know how to use them well, but fluency isn’t the same as understanding,” said Hamilton. “AI can answer a question in seconds, but it can’t replace a professor who pushes you to ask a better one. And part of teaching expertly in the AI age is making the human side of a Stanford education more valuable, not less: the conversations, the mentorship, the moments when a student realizes they’ve worked something out for themselves.”