By Ken McCarthy
Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
When Hazel and I started working with GenAI in higher education, we did not set out to write a manifesto. We were simply trying to make sense of a fast-moving landscape. GenAI arrived quickly, finding its way into classrooms and prompting new questions about academic integrity and AI integration long before we had time to work through what it all meant. Students were experimenting earlier than many staff felt prepared for. Policies were still forming.
What eventually became the Manifesto for Generative AI in Higher Education began as our attempt to capture our thoughts. Not a policy, not a fully fledged framework, not a strategy. Just a way to hold the questions, principles, and tensions that kept surfacing. It took shape through notes gathered in margins, comments shared after workshops, ideas exchanged in meetings, and moments in teaching sessions that stayed with us long after they ended. It was never a single project. It gathered itself slowly.
From the start, we wanted it to be a short read that opened the door to big ideas. The sector already has plenty of documents that run to seventy or eighty pages. Many of them are helpful, but they can be difficult to take into a team meeting or a coffee break. We wanted something different. Something that could be read in ten minutes, but still spark thought and conversation. A series of concise statements that felt recognisable to anyone grappling with the challenges and possibilities of GenAI. A document that holds principles without pretending to offer every answer. We took inspiration from the Edinburgh Manifesto for Teaching Online, which reminded us that a series of short, honest statements can travel further than a long policy ever will.
The manifesto is a living reflection. It recognises that we stand at a threshold between what learning has been and what it might become. GenAI brings possibility and uncertainty together, and our role is to respond with imagination and integrity to keep learning a deeply human act .
Three themes shaped the work
As the ideas settled, three themes emerged that helped give structure to the thirty statements.
Rethinking teaching and learning responds to an age of abundance. Information is everywhere. The task of teaching shifts toward helping students interpret, critique, and question rather than collect. Inquiry becomes central. Several statements address this shift, emphasising that GenAI does not replace thinking. It reveals the cost of not thinking. They point toward assessment design that rewards insight over detection and remind us that curiosity drives learning in ways that completion never can .
Responsibility, ethics, and power acknowledges that GenAI is shaped by datasets, values, and omissions. It is not neutral. This theme stresses transparency, ethical leadership, and the continuing importance of academic judgement. It challenges institutions to act with care, not just efficiency. It highlights that prompting is an academic skill, not a technical trick, and that GenAI looks different in every discipline, which means no single approach will fit all contexts.
Imagination, humanity, and the future encourages us to look beyond the disruption of the present moment and ask what we want higher education to become. It holds inclusion as a requirement rather than an aspiration. It names sustainability as a learning outcome. It insists that ethics belong at the beginning of design processes. It ends with the reminder that the horizon is still ours to shape and that the future classroom is a conversation where people and systems learn in dialogue without losing sight of human purpose
How it came together
The writing process was iterative. Some statements arrived whole. Others needed several attempts. We removed the ones that tried to do too much and kept the ones that stayed clear in the mind after a few days. We read them aloud to test the rhythm. The text only settled into its final shape once we noticed the three themes forming naturally.
The feedback from our reviewers, Tom Farrelly and Sue Beckingham, strengthened the final version. Their comments helped us tighten the language and balance the tone. The manifesto may have two named authors, but it is built from many voices.
Early responses from the sector
In the short time since the manifesto was released, the webpage has been visited by more than 750 people from 40 countries. For a document that began as a few lines in a notebook, this has been encouraging. It suggests the concerns and questions we tried to capture are widely shared. More importantly, it signals that there is an appetite for a conversation that is thoughtful, practical, and honest about the pace of change.
This early engagement reinforces something we felt from the start. The manifesto is only the beginning. It is not a destination. It is a point of departure for a shared journey.
Next steps: a book of voices across the sector
To continue that journey, we are developing a book of short essays and chapters that respond to the manifesto. Each contribution will explore a statement within the document. The chapters will be around 1,000 words. They can draw on practice, research, disciplinary experience, student partnership, leadership, policy, or critique. They can support, question, or challenge the manifesto. The aim is not agreement. The aim is insight.
We want to bring together educators, librarians, technologists, academic developers, researchers, students, and professional staff. The only requirement is that contributors have something to say about how GenAI is affecting their work, their discipline, or their students.
An invitation to join us
If you would like to contribute, we would welcome your expression of interest. You do not need specialist expertise in AI. You only need a perspective that might help the sector move forward with clarity and confidence.
Your chapter should reflect on a single statement. It could highlight emerging practice or ask questions that do not yet have answers. It could bring a disciplinary lens or a broader institutional one.
The manifesto was built from shared conversations. The next stage will be shaped by an even wider community. If this work is going to stay alive, it needs many hands.
The horizon is still ours to shape. If you would like to help shape it with us, please submit an expression of interest through the following link: https://forms.gle/fGTR9tkZrK1EeoLH8
Ken McCarthy
Head of Centre for Academic Practice
South East Technological University
I’m passionate about fostering academic excellence through professional development, curriculum design, and scholarship of teaching and learning. I also support and drive innovation in digital pedagogy and learning spaces.
