AI Won't Make You Smarter. Using It Right Might.
Mass adoption hits 92% on college campuses — but most are borrowing memories instead of building them.
Almost every student is using AI to study now. Adoption surveyed globally hit 92% in 2025, up from 66% just a year earlier, and a February 2026 Coursera survey of over 4,200 students and educators found usage on U.S. campuses is now close to universal. That part of the story is settled. Almost everyone has the tool open.
What's not settled — and what actually matters for your GPA — is what they're doing with it once it's open. That gap, between using AI and using it well, is where this whole conversation actually lives.
It's tempting to read "92% of students use AI" as evidence that AI is obviously working. It isn't evidence of that at all. Adoption measures whether the tab is open. It says nothing about whether what's happening in that tab builds a memory or just borrows one for twenty minutes.
