College degrees are losing meaning faster than tuition is rising. And no one wants to talk about it. I’m here to challenge the idea that real education only comes with a diploma - and to show what happens when you build your own.

I believe unconventional learning is what can keep us smart and creative in an age where many feel that artificial intelligence has taken away our originality. Right now, incoming college students search desperately for a major or a career path that won’t be taken over by AI. They sit through hours and hours of lectures from professors who, realistically, can’t keep up with the pace of progress. They spend more time figuring out how to cheat with ChatGPT and pass than actually studying. They scroll on LinkedIn for hours just to find an internship that will look good on their profile and speak using “professional” words they barely understand. And they pay tens of thousands of dollars a year to do it. 

All for a piece of paper that practically says, “I know something you don’t. In theory.” 

Let me be clear. I’m not saying that college graduates know nothing. But there’s no reason that a university should be deemed the only acceptable place to learn. Why is it presented as the only option? Why is a person only considered qualified if they have a college degree? 

In the age of artificial intelligence, almost nothing is out of reach. The future of learning won’t happen in lecture halls — it’ll happen in conversations with machines, ideas shared across time zones, and curiosity that doesn’t fit a syllabus.We have easy access to the works of the world's greatest minds and the greatest artificial mind yet to make it all accessible. Instead of rejecting it, we need to learn to work with it hand in hand. Much time is wasted trying to scan for AI, trying to keep it out of the classroom, and discouraging its use. Let’s be clear. Once a technology exists, it’s not going anywhere. No matter how hard you try to ignore it, it’s there and it will be used. 

So how can we use AI to our benefit when it comes to education? How can we disrupt the centuries-long belief that education has to look a certain way? 

I invite you to consider these questions on your own as well, but in the meantime, allow me to share what I’ll be doing in the next six months to promote my own learning, creativity, and ability to think outside-the-box and into the future. 

I’m in the process of creating an entire personalized education curriculum with ChatGPT. The topics I’m focusing on now are business, strategy, and quantum thinking. I’ve built lesson plans that span the six month period I have set out. I receive one lesson per subject in an email every day, with weekends for review. Each course has exercises and quizzes and a final capstone. And I tailor the learning to what I have learned I need in order to understand. 

That’s the best part - it doesn’t have to be one size fits all. I need metaphors to learn, you need real-life examples. A friend in London needs to hear their lessons, while one in California can only process reading. With an AI personalized curriculum, you can learn however works best for you. You can bounce ideas and questions off ChatGPT, a resource that will never decide it’s too tired for you and has to go home. You don’t have to stress about the language you choose to use and the grade you’ll get. You don’t have to struggle through texts that were written 100 years ago. Everything you build is built for you and can be adapted to meet your needs at any second. Education has never been so accessible. 

For those with a dream to make an impact, and the discipline to actually make it happen, AI opens up a world of possibilities and opportunities. It’s time to realize that a college degree isn’t the only thing proving that a person knows something.

I invite you to join me in this challenge. A challenge to make education accessible to anyone with the will and desire to know more, do more, understand more, think more. To think towards the future and work with change, not against it. 

The Thought Edit follows my experiment in designing a personalized, AI-guided education. Along the way, I explore bigger questions about how we learn, think, and stay human in a rapidly changing world.