The first meeting of our new AI community, chaired by Keith Smith, Chief Executive of Harrow, Richmond, and Uxbridge Colleges (HRUC), took place on Tuesday 2 July. This growing community brings together senior leaders and experts to explore how AI can support leadership, operations, and learner outcomes across the further education sector.
Setting the scene: AI as a tool for collaboration and impact
Keith Smith opened the meeting with a clear message: AI is a tool, not a threat. He highlighted the importance of collaboration and peer learning to harness AI’s potential for the benefit of all colleges. He invited members to actively contribute to and draw from the community, with a shared commitment to raising awareness and promoting effective practice.
Operational impact and strategic insight
Shelagh Legrave, Further Education Commissioner at the Department for Education, emphasised the role of leadership in ensuring AI supports system-wide improvement. She focused on how better systems and processes can lead to tangible back-office efficiencies, a priority in the current funding climate.
AI, innovation and the future of work
Then Steve Whittaker, Programme Director at MIT offered a global perspective, tracing the evolution of AI from early digital tools to today’s general-purpose machine learning systems. His talk explored the profound shifts underway in education and employment, including:
- Globalisation and its destabilising impact on job markets
- AI as an augmentation of human capability, not a replacement
- The erosion of mid-skill jobs and the rise of the knowledge economy
- The need to build future-focused skills around empathy, emotional intelligence, and creativity
Steve ended with a provocative question: “Our economic model assumes creativity is scarce — what if it isn’t?”
Strategic direction: The Jisc AI Framework
Sue Attewell, Head of AI at Jisc, introduced the Jisc Strategic AI Framework which provides a structured and practical approach for UK colleges and universities to adopt AI responsibly and effectively. It is built around three pillars, Skills & Knowledge, Technology, and Governance, all underpinned by data maturity. The framework supports staff and student development through training, self-paced resources, and curriculum integration. It encourages collaboration with external experts and communities to build confidence and competence across institutions.
On the technology side, it highlights the role of both general productivity tools (like Microsoft Copilot and Google Gemini) and education-specific platforms (like Blackboard AI and LearnWise). Governance ensures safe, principled use of AI with templates, model policies, and guidance covering ethics, privacy, and institutional alignment. Together, these elements help institutions move beyond experimentation towards sustainable, whole-organisation AI adoption.
We finished with a practical demonstration from Alex Denley, CTO of HRUC, of the college’s AI assistant and its role in tackling sector-wide challenges. In a live demo, Alex quizzed the AI assistant on the college’s own AI strategy, showcasing its ability to help critique and improve it.
Alex also discussed how AI can support:
- Student retention and progression through data-led insights
- Graduate outcomes by aligning more closely with real-time labour market trends
- The student experience through tools such as chatbots
- Campus utilisation through smarter space planning
- Operational decision-making, including retention analysis and bottleneck identification
Next steps for the community
The meeting closed with a call to action from Keith, to share insights, collaborate on challenges, and help shape the future of AI in colleges. As this community develops, its strength will lie in the breadth of its perspectives and the enthusiasm of its members to lead from the front.
To join this community, please sign up to our Jiscmail list.
Find out more by visiting our Artificial Intelligence page to view publications and resources, join us for events and discover what AI has to offer through our range of interactive online demos.
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Get in touch with the team directly at AI@jisc.ac.uk