How Babson College went all-in on AI in higher education

Over the past two years, US colleges have quietly integrated generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools into the classroom and behind the scenes.

At Babson College, just outside Boston, the shift to AI has been anything but quiet — it’s been bold, fast, and full of purpose.

Babson is certainly not the only college in the US implementing AI technologies. However, the college prides itself on being a business education innovator, maximizing GenAI to improve learning, simplify operations, and help students get ready for the world they’re about to enter.

Babson began putting its AI ideas into action in the fall of 2023 with the launch of the “EduAI Revolution.” This ambitious, campus-wide initiative has brought GenAI into nearly every corner of Babson’s academic and administrative life.

“We knew generative AI would be a game changer for higher ed, and wanted to be ahead of the curve,” says Babson CIO Patty Patria. “After piloting various tools and seeing how interested students were in GenAI, we quickly realized we needed a comprehensive strategy.”

Overcoming challenges to put EduAI into practice

Of course, making big changes comes with hurdles. Educating Babson faculty, staff, and students on the advantages and limitations of GenAI has been the biggest challenge so far.

“AI tools require faculty to teach differently than they did before, which in turn requires targeted training and support,” says Patria.

Babson has moved quickly. By early 2024, the college introduced GenAI initiatives in classrooms and administrative departments, such as:

• Foundations of AI Badge, a certification proving students understand AI basics, ethics, and tools. Over 150 students have been certified.
• Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses for students, faculty, and staff.
• MathBot, an AI tutor designed to support students who struggle with math.
• An AI Dashboard that tracks weekly AI usage and AI grant funding activity.
• AI analytics expertise: Babson hired a senior director of AI analytics to support its AI endeavors.
• The Generator, an AI lab for faculty to discuss and understand AI in higher education and other industries.
• An AI Teaching Training Program to help faculty experiment with AI and develop new courses.

AI in higher education: The direct effect on learning

Babson students aren’t just learning about AI — they’re using it to work more efficiently and think deeper.

Patria cites two examples of how Babson students, as part of the EduAI Revolution project, use AI in the classroom to be more productive and engaged.

In the “Artificial Intelligence for Business” graduate course, students built their own GenAI agents using various low code/no code tools. They learned to collaborate with the agents to analyze data, weigh different business options, and recommend pricing strategies for startups.

“Students who used the AI agents as true collaborators rather than simple writing assistants got the most out of it,” says Patria. “They were able to challenge their assumptions and come up with more well-developed business ideas.”

In Babson’s Master of Science in Management in Entrepreneurial Leadership (MSEL) program, students in the “Leading Entrepreneurial Action Project” course used custom GenAI agents to test and shape business ideas. The agents — again designed by students using various low code/no code tools — came preloaded with real business frameworks and could create realistic customer personas that students “interviewed” to test assumptions about customer behavior. This saved time on research and helped students quickly refine their business models and get ready for real-world conversations.

Another AI agent used in the course, called the “Risk Coach,” helped teams figure out the biggest pitfalls posed by their business model and offered suggestions on how to test and manage risk.

“These AI agents made it easier for students to move faster with their startup experiments while gaining a deeper understanding of business risks,” says Patria.

AI behind the scenes: Running smarter college operations

GenAI isn’t just changing how students learn — it’s also making life easier for the people who keep Babson running every day.

Across departments such as IT, marketing, enrollment, finance, and human resources, Babson’s staff members are using generative AI to save time and work smarter. They’re using it to write and edit content, run surveys, crunch data, conduct research, and help with coding.

According to Patria, the marketing and enrollment teams are the heaviest users. Marketing uses GenAI tools within M365 Copilot to write ad copy, emails, and presentations. Enrollment uses Copilot to predict enrollment levels, collect insights from student survey results, and analyze tuition pricing.

And it’s working. In a staff survey from April 2025, 73% of employees said AI tools help them be more innovative, and 74% said AI has increased job satisfaction.

Much to Patria’s surprise, more than half of Babson’s staff — 53% — said they’re interested in building their own AI bots using beginner-friendly tools that don’t require coding.

“To support this interest, we’re planning to host a staff hack-a-thon in the fall,” says Patria. “It’ll be a hands-on event where teams can learn, get mentoring, and try solving real-world business problems using GenAI.”

For its work implementing GenAI tools across all departments, Babson College earned a 2025 CIO 100 Award for driving digital business growth through technology innovation and leadership.

What’s next: Babson’s AI 2.0 plan

More than a year into Babson’s EduAI Revolution, the college is already looking ahead.

Starting this July, Patria says Babson will launch its “AI 2.0 Plan,” which will go beyond basic productivity tools and explore more advanced GenAI scenarios — like co-creating content, rethinking how courses are taught, building more intelligent agents, and using multimodal tools that combine text, images, and video.

Looking further out, Babson plans to bring together faculty, staff, students, and outside leaders to map out a shared vision for the next three to five years of AI on campus. Babson’s goal, according to Patria, is not just to keep up with the pace of AI, but to spark new ideas and help define AI’s future role in business education.

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