Student Interest in A.I., Machine Learning is Accelerating

Across the U.S., more and more students are enrolling in introductory A.I. and machine learning classes, according to The A.I. Index 2019 Annual Report (PDF) produced by Stanford University. That's good news for students everywhere, because it means that more schools will inevitably begin offering this sort of coursework. It's also good for employers desperate for A.I. and machine learning specialists, because it means that pool of talent will likely expand over the next few years as these students enter the workforce. At Stanford itself, enrollment in the school's "Introduction to Artificial Intelligence" course has grown "fivefold" between 2012 and 2018, according to the report. That's not even the most rapid uptake: At the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, an "Introduction to Machine Learning" course grew twelvefold between 2010 and 2018, with the largest part of that spike occurring after 2015.