Proceedings of International Structural Engineering and Construction, 11(1), 2024 Leading Construction Technology Systems for Today’s Environmental and Social Crises Edited by Villacís, E., Ayarza, C., Bucheli, J., Yazdani, S., and Singh, A. Copyright © 2024 ISEC Press ISSN: 2644-108X www.doi.org/10.14455/ISEC.2024.11(1).EPE-11 EPE-11-1 ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: A LOOK BACK TO THE FUTURE IN UNIVERSITY EDUCATION MOHSEN ABBASI, MICHAEL MAKS DAVIS, RAFAEL MELGAREJO HEREDIA, and DIEGO ANTONIO ORDÓÑEZ CAMACHO Center for Experimental Science and Innovation, International Faculty of Innovation PUCE- Icam, Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador, Quito, Ecuador The year 2023 marked a significant advancement in artificial intelligence, but the education community was not necessarily prepared for the introduction and use of new software such as ChatGPT, Adobe Generative Fill, Stable Diffusion, and others. AI could be asked to write essays, plan project work, or simply keep students’ company through long hours of solitary study. The question remains, is AI the enemy educators should resist, a colleague that should be encouraged to facilitate student learning, or where is the space to be occupied somewhere between the two extremes? In this context, the research seeks to go beyond knowing whether and how students are using AI, to begin to understand why they use it as they have done throughout 2023. A semi- structured survey was carried out with the public including students and teachers from different faculties and disciplines from all around Ecuador, who had found AI coming into their professional. The insights from the survey will be compared between each other and with published material with bottom-up experiences that were felt at a student level. The impact will be that we will be able to assess where, how, and why we will operate over the coming years. Keywords: Advancement, Generative, Embracement, Benefits, Concerns, Engagement, Data security, Ethics, Governance, Algorithms. 1 INTRODUCTION Educators and students alike were taken by surprise when, in 2023, AI programs such as ChatGPT, Adobe Generative Fill, Stable Diffusion, and others, entered the internet by storm (Prahani et al. 2022). They were suddenly exposed to a form of AI that could interact with its users (Xu et al. 2021), be asked to write essays, and plan project work (Aragón et al. 2023) and even provide a form of company in the long hours of solitude meeting a deadline can entail (Fréjus et al. 2022). This study aims to go beneath the surface and find the underlying motivations driving professionals, teachers, and students to use artificial intelligence (AI) tools in their academic endeavors in an era where the lines between technology and education are constantly becoming more blurred. The rising accessibility of AI technology to both students and educators has led to a need for a comprehensive knowledge of the underlying factors that drive its adoption into education (Rodzi et al. 2023). The ability to comprehend information has the potential to contribute to policymaking (Chhillar and Aguilera 2022), facilitate the development of creative solutions (Das and Varshney 2022), and improve the overall educational experience (Allam et al. 2023). The findings will be paired with previous studies that investigate the potential of ChatGPT in improving academic advising in higher education (Akiba and Fraboni 2023) and the utilization of it in education to augment engagement and deliver immediate feedback (Ilieva et al. 2023).