University of Utah symposium featured in the 2026 EDUCAUSE Horizon Report for advancing relationship-centered AI literacy in higher education

The University of Utah’s Student-Led AI Symposium was recently highlighted in the 2026 EDUCAUSE Horizon Report: Teaching and Learning Edition as a national example of innovative, relationship-centered AI literacy work in higher education.

Grounded in a relational AI literacy framework, the symposium flipped the traditional conference model by asking students to set the agenda, lead every session, and share how they are actually using AI in their academic lives. More than 130 students, faculty, and staff attended the inaugural event in Fall 2025, creating what organizers described as a moment of “reperception,” where participants began seeing both AI knowledge and each other differently. The Horizon Report positioned the symposium as part of a broader national shift toward “transparency and invitation over surveillance and detection” in higher education AI conversations.

The report also noted the emergence of the weekly AI Tinker Lab as a natural continuation of this work, framing the initiative as “movement, not mastery” in building collaborative AI learning communities. Building on this momentum, the University of Utah will host the next Student-Led AI Symposium in Fall 2026.