From the Big Picture to Quick Wins: The Next Two Years of AI in Academic Libraries (Part 2)

A roundtable with ACRL's Artificial Intelligence Interest Group conveners

Posted on May 6, 2026 in Blog Posts

The simple truth is that it’s hard to keep up with AI. Even those passionate about the topic surely struggle to stay up to date with the latest applications, problems, policies, lawsuits, and discussions surrounding it. And while understanding the present landscape is challenging enough, we must nevertheless plan for the future to make sure we and our institutions are ready for it. 

The editorial team at Choice has been mulling over the question, What does AI in libraries look like two years from now? Two years ago, we were finalizing our white paper on defining AI literacy, which would come to form the backbone of ACRL’s AI Competencies for Library Workers. These were big moves, but only preliminary ones. Since then, libraries across the world have put together workshops and communities of practice, integrated chatbots into digital collections, evaluated research tools, and taught critical frameworks to students and faculty. And yet the question remains: now that we have a better understanding of AI and more confidence in dealing with it, where do we go from here?

To help us tackle this question, we invited the three conveners of ACRL’s Artificial Intelligence Interest Group, who have engaged with AI on the ground at their institutions and also have a unique bird’s-eye view of the profession from their perch in the interest group. In the interview below, Heather Sardis (MIT), Virginia (Ginny) Pannabecker (Virginia Tech), and Amanda Y. Makula (Univ. of San Diego) discuss the next two years of AI in libraries, quick wins for libraries with limited budgets, partnerships between libraries and other university bodies, and more. Below is the second part of our conversation.

💫 Learn more about the ACRL AI Interest Group and join on ALA Connect

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It became apparent in the comments on LibTech Insights/Clarivate’s recent micro-course on AI literacy that librarians have the abilities and the appetite for taking on the challenge of AI in higher ed, but they often lack institutional support. What resources or partnerships should libraries prioritize to make headway?

Amanda: One of the most important things we can do is look for internal, cross-campus collaborations with other units within our colleges and universities. Reach out and start the conversation with campus centers on teaching, research, innovation, the ITS department, the Provost’s office, the Office of Research, etc. Find out what they are talking about in relation to AI and look for ways to partner. Embed a library administrator or librarian on university-wide committees charged with examining AI use and policy. Initiate conversations with faculty about their thoughts and experiences with AI in the classroom and in their scholarly projects. Doing these things positions the library as a vital contributor and an active participant—listening, responding, and actively shaping the direction of the institution as a whole as it navigates a “new normal” of AI in higher education.

For example, at the University of San Diego, the Office of the Provost formed an AI Steering Committee to explore responsible and ethical AI strategy and integration, with five key working groups—Teaching and Learning; Research and Scholarship; Data, Administration, and Operational Excellence; The Student Experience; and the Catholic Intellectual Tradition and the Human Experience—to review best practices and recommend policies. The library is represented by faculty members serving on two of these working groups. We also have cross-pollination with AI literacy efforts on campus, as both the library and the Provost’s Office have led AI trainings, and members from both groups have attended one another’s workshops.

Heather: In addition to everything that Amanda described (which I agree with!), librarians should identify our unique niche in campus conversations about AI. What skills and perspectives can we uniquely contribute? The ALA Core Values of Librarianship emphasize intellectual freedom and privacy, equity, and a focus on the public good, and the ACRL AI Competencies for Academic Library Workers outline ethical considerations that can guide our conversations with campus constituents. These values often get overshadowed in institutional AI discussions, which are primarily focused on efficiency, innovation, or competitive advantage.

As stewards of information with a long history of evaluating emerging technologies for their long-term impact, librarians are uniquely positioned to advocate for a values-first approach to AI, one that asks not just “What can this technology do?” but also “How do we evaluate, teach, and implement it responsibly?” By securing a seat at the table through the cross-campus collaborations Amanda outlined, librarians can ensure these critical perspectives shape how AI is governed and used at their institutions.

Amanda: Beyond our own campuses, it’s exciting to see existing library consortia, conferences, and organizations address AI. Every week, I see new AI-related webinars and professional development opportunities coming from a variety of sources. Library directors and deans can invest in AI developments by encouraging (and offering funding for) faculty and staff to attend trainings, so they can bring back new knowledge and infuse it into library operations. At my institution, when we had our annual all-library retreat, one of our guest speakers was charged with addressing AI. Librarians tend to be folks who are curious and eager to learn, and this certainly works to our advantage in the new AI landscape!

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All three of you have served as moderators for ACRL’s AI interest group in ALA Connect. With more than 250 posts, it has emerged as an important discussion hub. What have you learned or observed from moderating this community?

Heather: Convening the AI Interest Group has been so energizing! The AI IG community includes librarians from a wide variety of roles and institutional contexts, from small liberal arts colleges to large research universities, from technical services to instruction, but we are all united by a shared commitment to building fluency with AI as a transformative technology in libraries. What has been most striking is hearing about how much librarians are already doing, and bringing to the table at our IG discussions: using AI in collection development and cataloging, evaluating vendor claims, supporting responsible use in student writing and faculty research, and developing institutional guidance around transparency and reproducibility.

The great strength of the AI Interest Group lies in sharing these approaches across our different institutional contexts: an innovation sparked by the unique setting of a community college library can inspire teams at a large research library to think differently, and vice versa. At our 2025 ALA Annual meetup, over 250 attendees came together to move the conversation beyond broad discussions and towards specific library applications: How do we use AI responsibly in collection development? What guidance should researchers receive about documenting AI use? The interest group has grown into a space for librarians to share ideas, form collaborations, and build expertise together.

What would you like to see the AI interest group become? And, of course, what’s the pitch for joining the community today?

Amanda: Virtually all aspects of academic library work are, or will be, touched in some way or another by AI: research and instruction, collection development, cataloging and metadata, electronic resources, archives and special collections, library administration, scholarly communication, and the list goes on. This community offers a space for academic library professionals—regardless of specific position or job area—to connect, share, network, learn, and grow; to expand their awareness and understanding of AI on both a practical and theoretical level; and to try to “keep up” and stay current amid rapid changes. AI appeals to our desire for efficiency and productivity, but the cognitive overload of learning new tools, following legal and policy developments, and shifting to new ways of doing our work is staggering. We need each other!

We’ve already seen significant growth. This interest group began as a discussion group and is now on track towards becoming a section. There’s active discussion through the listserv and solid attendance at monthly meet-ups. We have over 300 members in our first year as an interest group, and we have members presenting talks and forming subgroups to hone in on specific areas of interest, such as one subgroup addressing AI’s impact on technical services, one focusing on librarian-authored research and scholarship about AI, and one exploring prompting and agent/gem/project creation. We expect more subgroups to develop as specific interests and needs emerge—starting a subgroup is also a great way to build your leadership (or co-leadership) skills and contribute to our shared learning as a community.

In short, it’s a vibrant community! And we’re always welcoming new participants. We encourage you to join today to add your voice to the conversation!

💫 Learn more about the ACRL AI Interest Group and join on ALA Connect

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