The Future Ready Learning panel at the Boise Metro Chamber‘s 2026 Regional Leadership Conference brought together panelists to discuss what is actually happening inside Idaho’s colleges and universities, and what it will take to get the rest right. AI is rewriting the rules on how students learn, how faculty teach, how institutions assess, and how administrators manage the enormous complexity of running a university.
The chair of the Department of Computer Science at Boise State, Jerry Fails, shared his thoughts on the AI challenge in higher education:
“GenAI is here, it’s reshaping higher education, and that impact is only going to grow. We have to keep adapting nimbly — equipping students with the foundational technical skills they’ll always need, while also helping them learn to maximize the beneficial uses of tools like GenAI. Blending human judgment, problem solving, and creativity with AI capability isn’t a future skill; it’s the one we need to be teaching right now.”
The panel featured David Turnbull, founder and chairman of Brighton Corporation and member of the Idaho State Board of Education; Dr. Ben Hunter, dean of libraries at the University of Idaho; Jennifer White, executive director of the Idaho State Board of Education; and moderated by Mike Reynoldson, vice president of public affairs at Blue Cross of Idaho.
For more info on the current state of AI, read our recent article More AI, Means More Computer Science.