More than a year after the California State University System invested millions of dollars in a plan to expand the state’s artificial intelligence-enabled workforce, new data shows the majority of students, faculty and staff at the nation’s largest university system are using AI-powered tools, despite some resistance and skepticism.
ChatGPT, which is accessible to the entire CSU system through a partnership with OpenAI, is our most popular tool.
On Wednesday, the CSU System, which has 460,000 students and 63,000 faculty and staff across 23 campuses, released a report detailing its findings on how AI is used and other findings from a fall 2025 survey of 94,060 respondents, including 80,626 students, 6,085 faculty, and 7,349 faculty.
According to the survey, the majority of respondents (95%) have used at least one of the 21 AI tools listed in the survey. Furthermore, 64 percent of staff, 59 percent of faculty, and 53 percent of students report using AI tools consistently and continuously, including those who report using AI tools outside of work.
“This study captures a transitional moment in higher education where both students and faculty are actively evaluating how AI fits into teaching and learning,” David Goldberg, an AI faculty fellow at San Diego State University and one of the study’s principal investigators, said in a news release. “This data provides a strong foundation to better support teachers by tailoring training to real-world needs, bringing consistency to the use of AI in the classroom, and ensuring that its use enhances learning outcomes. It also provides a roadmap for educational institutions across the country to better understand the role of AI and deploy it thoughtfully, consistently, and responsibly.”
Despite results showing that CSU’s systems are embracing AI, the data also suggest that faculty have not reached a consensus on the place of AI in the classroom.
Just over a quarter of faculty respondents said they remained neutral regarding the use of AI by students. 22 percent discourage it and 19 percent encourage it. Just under one in five (18 per cent) ban it completely, while 6 per cent require it and 7 per cent don’t touch their students at all. At the same time, more than half (55%) of faculty are using AI to develop course materials, and 69% are providing guidance to students to use AI effectively and responsibly.
California is ChatGPT country
Although there are many AI-powered tools on the market, 84 percent of students, 87 percent of faculty, and 89 percent of staff cite ChatGPT as the tool they use most. Other tools such as Grammarly, Canva, Microsoft Copilot, and Google Gemini vary in popularity and use.
ChatGPT became the first mainstream large-scale language model when OpenAI debuted it in November 2022, but evidence of widespread use in the CSU system came after the university signed a $17 million deal with OpenAI last year to provide everyone on campus with access to ChatGPT Edu. According to OpenAI, the benefit of paying for an education-only version of the LLM is that it can be used within a closed and secure system. Other technology companies are rolling out similar products, but OpenAI has dominated the higher education market so far. As of December, the company had sold more than 700,000 ChatGPT licenses to at least 35 public universities.
However, some faculty in the CSU system have opposed the OpenAI contract, arguing that there is not much evidence that ChatGPT Edu will benefit teaching and learning. “This is a general-purpose chatbot that was not designed, trained, or optimized for education,” says a faculty-led petition calling on Chancellor Mildred Garcia not to renew CSU’s contract with OpenAI, which expires on June 30, and instead to reinvest the funds into a human workforce. “Aside from privacy and security features, ChatGPT Edu is identical to the free online version of ChatGPT,” the company said.
Although the study did not differentiate between the use of ChatGPT and ChatGPT Edu, it found that more than half of faculty, one-third of staff, and one-quarter of students access AI tools through their institution.
In this study, teachers also emerged as key critics of AI.
One faculty member said, “I worry that I am training students to rely on AI rather than developing their own critical thinking skills.” “I am committed to preparing students for this inevitable technology without supporting manufacturers of tools that advance carelessly and without consideration for social harm,” said another.
Still, teachers are divided on the impact AI has had on education, with 56 percent reporting a positive impact and 52 percent saying it has had a negative impact. By comparison, 72 percent of staff and 64 percent of students reported positive effects, but about 80 percent of students said they felt uncomfortable submitting AI-generated work as their own. A majority of all respondents said they need to verify the accuracy of AI-generated content.
Separate research data from Educause shows that faculty are using AI for tasks such as brainstorming, drafting emails, summarizing long documents and meetings, proofreading, and creating presentations. Students, on the other hand, use this technology to get answers to questions, proofread or edit their own work, and summarize lecture notes and articles.
Skepticism persists
Despite increased adoption, 65 percent of students and 59 percent of faculty responding to the CSU survey expressed skepticism about whether AI is benefiting education overall.
“The American Association of University Professors’ Ad Hoc AI and Academic Specialties Committee Chair, Britt Paris, said: Inside higher education The CSU System said its findings show that “people in higher education are becoming more critical of AI as it relates to the work of teaching and learning” and that “AI intervention in corporate education is giving leaders and learners pause.”
Mixed feelings aside, the survey reveals that most people across the CSU system are feeling pressure to jump on the AI bandwagon, as the technology industry continues to predict that the entry-level job market will be reshaped and contracted in the coming years.
Approximately 82 percent of staff, 78 percent of faculty, and 69 percent of students said they believe AI will become an integral part of most jobs. Meanwhile, a similar proportion expressed concerns about job security. The majority of staff (82 percent) and faculty (72 percent) also want formal AI training, while nearly half of students (49 percent) say the same.
“I don’t want to use it, but I have to!” said one student respondent. “If I don’t, I’ll be left behind, and that’s what no one wants in this stupid job market.”
