Major Changes Reshape Law Schools Nationwide in 2026 — from jdjournal.com by Ma Fatima
Law schools across the United States are entering one of the most transformative periods in recent memory. In 2026, legal education is being reshaped by leadership turnover, shifting accreditation standards, changes to student loan policies, and the introduction of a redesigned bar exam. Together, these developments are forcing law schools to rethink how they educate students and prepare future lawyers for a rapidly evolving legal profession.
Also from jdjournal.com, see:
- Healthcare Industry Legal Careers: High-Growth Roles and Paths — from jdjournal.com by Ma Fatima
The healthcare industry is rapidly emerging as one of the most promising and resilient sectors for legal professionals, driven by expanding regulations, technological innovation, and an increasingly complex healthcare delivery system. As hospitals, life sciences companies, insurers, and digital health platforms navigate constant regulatory change, demand for experienced legal talent continues to rise.
Shoppers will soon be able to make purchases directly through Google’s Gemini app and browser.
Google and Walmart Join Forces to Shape the Future of Retail — from adweek.com by Lauren Johnson
At NRF, Sundar Pichai and John Furner revealed how AI and drones will shape shopping in 2026 and beyond
One of the biggest reveals is that shoppers will be able to purchase Walmart and Sam’s Club products through Google’s AI chatbot Gemini.
What 3 credit ratings agencies forecast for higher ed in 2026 — from highereddive.com by Ben Unglesbee
Fitch Ratings, S&P Global and Moody’s Ratings all predicted a tough year ahead, pointing to deteriorating financial conditions and heightened uncertainty.
Fitch Ratings labeled its higher ed financial outlook for 2026 as “deteriorating” while Moody’s Ratings described an “increasingly difficult and shifting operating environment for colleges and universities.” Similarly, S&P Global Ratings said it expects“mounting operating pressures and uncertainty” ahead for the sector’s nonprofit institutions.
Analysts cited additional disruption and belt-tightening ahead in the new year, from predicted demographic declines to pressures on international enrollment to uncertainties about how Republicans’ big spending bill passed this summer will impact demand for college.
Below are the various takes on higher ed in 2026 by Moody’s, Fitch and S&P Global Ratings:
Rebuilding The First Rung Of The Opportunity Ladder — from forbes.com by Bruno V. Manno
Two-thirds of employers say most new hires are not fully prepared for their roles, citing “experience,” not technical skill, as the greatest shortfall. At the same time, 61% of companies have raised their experience requirements.
As a result, many so-called entry-level roles now demand two to five years of prior work experience. The first rung of the career ladder has been pulled even farther out of reach for new job seekers. A portfolio—or full-spectrum—model of work-based learning is one promising way to rebuild that rung.
Experience has become what Deloitte calls “the new currency of employability.” But the places where young people once earned that currency are disappearing.
Coursera to Combine with Udemy to Empower the Global Workforce with Skills for the AI Era — from investor.coursera.com
Highly Complementary Capabilities Will Create a Leading Technology Platform, Redefining Skills Discovery, Development, and Mastery for Learners and Organizations at Scale
Unites Udemy’s Dynamic AI-Powered Skills Development Marketplace with World-Class University and Industry Brands Under the Coursera Ecosystem, Expanding Value, Impact, and Choice Globally
Strengthens Combined Company’s Financial Profile with Pro Forma Annual Revenue of More Than $1.5 Billion and Anticipated Annual Run-Rate Cost Synergies of $115 Million Within 24 Months
“We’re at a pivotal moment in which AI is rapidly redefining the skills required for every job across every industry. Organizations and individuals around the world need a platform that is as agile as the new and emerging skills learners must master,” said Greg Hart, CEO of Coursera. “By combining the highly complementary strengths of Coursera and Udemy, we will be in an even stronger position to address the global talent transformation opportunity, unlock a faster pace of innovation, and deliver valuable experiences and outcomes for our learners and customers. Together, we will ensure our millions of learners, thousands of enterprise, university, and government customers, and expert instructors have a platform to keep pace with technology acceleration.”
AI Has Landed in Education: Now What? — from learningfuturesdigest.substack.com by Dr. Philippa Hardman
Here’s what’s shaped the AI-education landscape in the last month:
- The AI Speed Trap is [still] here: AI adoption in L&D is basically won (87%)—but it’s being used to ship faster, not learn better (84% prioritising speed), scaling “more of the same” at pace.
- AI tutors risk a “pedagogy of passivity”: emerging evidence suggests tutoring bots can reduce cognitive friction and pull learners down the ICAP spectrum—away from interactive/constructive learning toward efficient consumption.
- Singapore + India are building what the West lacks: they’re treating AI as national learning infrastructure—for resilience (Singapore) and access + language inclusion (India)—while Western systems remain fragmented and reactive.
- Agentic AI is the next pivot: early signs show a shift from AI as a content engine to AI as a learning partner—with UConn using agents to remove barriers so learners can participate more fully in shared learning.
- Moodle’s AI stance sends two big signals: the traditional learning ecosystem in fragmenting, and the concept of “user sovereignty” over by AI is emerging.
Four strategies for implementing custom AIs that help students learn, not outsource — from educational-innovation.sydney.edu.au by Kria Coleman, Matthew Clemson, Laura Crocco and Samantha Clarke; via Derek Bruff
For Cogniti to be taken seriously, it needs to be woven into the structure of your unit and its delivery, both in class and on Canvas, rather than left on the side. This article shares practical strategies for implementing Cogniti in your teaching so that students:
- understand the context and purpose of the agent,
- know how to interact with it effectively,
- perceive its value as a learning tool over any other available AI chatbots, and
- engage in reflection and feedback.
In this post, we discuss how to introduce and integrate Cogniti agents into the learning environment so students understand their context, interact effectively, and see their value as customised learning companions.
In this post, we share four strategies to help introduce and integrate Cogniti in your teaching so that students understand their context, interact effectively, and see their value as customised learning companions.
Collection: Teaching with Custom AI Chatbots — from teaching.virginia.edu; via Derek Bruff
The default behaviors of popular AI chatbots don’t always align with our teaching goals. This collection explores approaches to designing AI chatbots for particular pedagogical purposes.
Example/excerpt:
- Not Your Default Chatbot: Five Teaching Applications of Custom AI Bots
Agile Learning
derekbruff.org/2025/10/01/five-teaching-applications-of-custom-ai-chatbots/
7 Legal Tech Trends That Will Reshape Every Business In 2026 — from forbes.com by Bernard Marr
Here are the trends that will matter most.
- AI Agents As Legal Assistants
- AI As A Driver Of Business Strategy
- Automation In Judicial Administration
- Always-On Compliance Monitoring
- Cybersecurity As An Essential Survival Tool
- Predictive Litigation
- Compliance As Part Of The Everyday Automation Fabric
According to the Thomson Reuters Future Of Professionals report, most experts already expect AI to transform their work within five years, with many viewing it as a positive force. The challenge now is clear: legal and compliance leaders must understand the tools reshaping their field and prepare their teams for a very different way of working in 2026.
Addendum on 12/17/25:
- Top 10 legal tech episodes in 2025 — from lawyersweekly.com.au
With AI and legal technology at the forefront of the profession’s mind now more than ever, The Lawyers Weekly Show and our special series LawTech Talks delivered in-depth explorations of these game-changing topics. Now, we’re highlighting the 10 most downloaded episodes that sparked conversation across the legal tech community. - eCourtDate Winner Of “LegalOps Platform of the Year” In 2025 LegalTech Breakthrough Awards Program — from globenewswire.com
Prestigious Annual Awards Program Recognizes Companies and Products Driving Innovation in the Global Legal Industry
Agents, robots, and us: Skill partnerships in the age of AI — from mckinsey.com by Lareina Yee, Anu Madgavkar, Sven Smit, Alexis Krivkovich, Michael Chui, María Jesús Ramírez, and Diego Castresana
AI is expanding the productivity frontier. Realizing its benefits requires new skills and rethinking how people work together with intelligent machines.
At a glance
- Work in the future will be a partnership between people, agents, and robots—all powered by AI. …
- Most human skills will endure, though they will be applied differently. …
- Our new Skill Change Index shows which skills will be most and least exposed to automation in the next five years….
- Demand for AI fluency—the ability to use and manage AI tools—has grown sevenfold in two years…
- By 2030, about $2.9 trillion of economic value could be unlocked in the United States…
Also related/see:
- The state of AI in 2025: Agents, innovation, and transformation — from mckinsey.com
Almost all survey respondents say their organizations are using AI, and many have begun to use AI agents. But most are still in the early stages of scaling AI and capturing enterprise-level value.
State of AI: December 2025 newsletter — from nathanbenaich.substack.com by Nathan Benaich
What you’ve got to know in AI from the last 4 weeks.
Welcome to the latest issue of the State of AI, an editorialized newsletter that covers the key developments in AI policy, research, industry, and start-ups over the last month.
Could Your Next Side Hustle Be Training AI? — from builtin.com by Jeff Rumage
As automation continues to reshape the labor market, some white-collar professionals are cashing in by teaching AI models to do their jobs.
Summary: Artificial intelligence may be replacing jobs, but it’s also creating some new ones. Professionals in fields like medicine, law and engineering can earn big money training AI models, teaching them human skills and expertise that may one day make those same jobs obsolete.
DEEP DIVE: The AI user interface of the future = Voice — from theneurondaily.com by Grant Harvey
PLUS: Gemini 3.0 and Microsoft’s new voice features
Here’s the thing: voice is finally good enough to replace typing now. And I mean actually good enough, not “Siri, play Despacito” good enough.
To Paraphrase Andrej Karpathy’s famous quote, “the hottest new programming language is English”, in this case, the hottest new user interface is talking.
The Great Convergence: Why Voice Is Having Its Moment
Three massive shifts just collided to make voice interfaces inevitable.
-
- First, speech recognition stopped being terrible. …
- Second, our devices got ears everywhere. …
- Third, and most importantly: LLMs made voice assistants smart enough to be worth talking to. …
Introducing group chats in ChatGPT — from openai.com
Collaborate with others, and ChatGPT, in the same conversation.
Update on November 20, 2025: Early feedback from the pilot has been positive, so we’re expanding group chats to all logged-in users on ChatGPT Free, Go, Plus and Pro plans globally over the coming days. We will continue refining the experience as more people start using it.
Today, we’re beginning to pilot a new experience in a few regions that makes it easy for people to collaborate with each other—and with ChatGPT—in the same conversation. With group chats, you can bring friends, family, or coworkers into a shared space to plan, make decisions, or work through ideas together.
Whether you’re organizing a group dinner or drafting an outline with coworkers, ChatGPT can help. Group chats are separate from your private conversations, and your personal ChatGPT memory is never shared with anyone in the chat.
New Study: Business As Usual Could Doom Dozens Of New England Colleges — from forbes.com by Michael B. Horn
The cause of the challenges isn’t one single factor, but a series of pressures from demographic changes, shifts in the public’s perception of higher education’s value, rising operating costs, emerging alternatives to traditional colleges, and, of late, changes in federal policies and programs. The net effect is that many institutions are much closer to the brink of closure than ever before.
What’s daunting is that flat enrollment is almost certainly an overly optimistic scenario.
If enrollment at the 44 schools falls by 15 percent over the next four years and business proceeds as usual, then 28 of the schools will have less than 10 years of cash and unrestricted quasi-endowments before they would become insolvent—assuming no major cuts, additional philanthropy, new debt, or asset sales. Fourteen would have less than five years before insolvency.
Also see:
- A Looming Crisis: New Analysis Shows Dozens of Well-Known Colleges Are Near Financial Trouble — from michaelbhorn.substack.com by Michael B. Horn and Steven M. Shulman
From DSC:
The cultures at many institutions of traditional higher education will make some of the necessary changes and strategies (that Michael and Steven discuss) very hard to make. For example, to merge with another institution or institutions. Such a strategy could be very challenging to implement, even as alternatives continue to emerge.
Three Years from GPT-3 to Gemini 3 — from oneusefulthing.org by Ethan Mollick
From chatbots to agents
Three years ago, we were impressed that a machine could write a poem about otters. Less than 1,000 days later, I am debating statistical methodology with an agent that built its own research environment. The era of the chatbot is turning into the era of the digital coworker. To be very clear, Gemini 3 isn’t perfect, and it still needs a manager who can guide and check it. But it suggests that “human in the loop” is evolving from “human who fixes AI mistakes” to “human who directs AI work.” And that may be the biggest change since the release of ChatGPT.
Results May Vary — from aiedusimplified.substack.com by Lance Eaton, PhD
On Custom Instructions with GenAI Tools….
I’m sharing today about custom instructions and my use of them across several AI tools (paid versions of ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude). I want to highlight what I’m doing, how it’s going, and solicit from readers to share in the comments some of their custom instructions that they find helpful.
I’ve been in a few conversations lately that remind me that not everyone knows about them, even some of the seasoned folks around GenAI and how you might set them up to better support your work. And, of course, they are, like all things GenAI, highly imperfect!
I’ll include and discuss each one below, but if you want to keep abreast of my custom instructions, I’ll be placing them here as I adjust and update them so folks can see the changes over time.
I analyzed 180M jobs to see what jobs AI is actually replacing today — from bloomberry.com by Henley Wing Chiu; via Kim Isenberg
I analyzed nearly 180 million global job postings from January 2023 to October 2025, using data from Revealera, a provider of jobs data. While I acknowledge not all job postings result in a hire, and some are ‘ghost jobs’, since I was comparing the relative growth in job titles, this didn’t seem like a big issue to me.
I simply wanted to know which specific job titles declined or grew the most in 2025, compared to 2024. Because those were likely to be ones that AI is impacting the most.
Key Sections
- Total Job Postings declined 8% in 2025
- Which job titles declined the most in 2025 compared to 2024?
- Creative jobs declined the most but not all of them
- Corporate compliance + sustainability jobs are declining fast
- AI might be taking away jobs from medical scribes
- Which job titles increased the most in 2025 compared to 2024?
- Machine Learning Engineers were the #1 growing job in 2025
- Demand for senior leadership is much stronger than middle managers
- Influencer marketer was 1 of the top growing jobs overall in 2025
- Software Engineering Jobs have been resilient in 2025
- Data-related jobs are holding steady
- Customer Service Representatives jobs are not being mass replaced by AI
- Sales jobs are holding steady
- My Methodology
- Want to know how your job title performed in 2025?
Also from Kim Isenberg, see:
- October Layoffs Were the Worst in 22 Years and Hit Tech Workers Hard — from gizmodo.com by Lucas Ropek
For coders, October royally sucked.