Supporting Intercultural Learning with AI

Last month, I attended my first International Internship Conference (IIC), where there was a lot of talk about AI. While my knowledge and experience on this topic are limited, the conference definitely piqued my interest! In this post, I’m sharing some of the learning, reflections, and questions I took from the experience.

There’s a significant AI learning gap.

Employers in a wide variety of fields are increasingly looking for employees who know how to utilize AI effectively. That does not mean using AI to do our work for us, but to help us work better—to superpower what we’re doing. AI is a blank slate that simply follows orders. Using it well requires critical thinking and knowing how to use good prompts, among other things. These are skills that need to be intentionally taught. We need to learn how to make AI work for and with us.

In general, however, higher education is doing a poor job of teaching students how to utilize AI well. In fact, in a lot of cases, institutions and educators are sending the opposite message—that using AI is cheating or wrong. We need to get more intentional about integrating AI learning into the curriculum (something I say ad nauseum about intercultural competence as well).

Growth of AI amplifies the need for “soft skills.”

The growth of AI amplifies the need for skills such as problem-solving, communication, critical thinking, compassion, and integrity. These types of skills become increasingly important in an AI-powered world, not less important.

Higher education may want to invest more in the Humanities as AI reduces the importance of content-based knowledge. Students need to learn to think critically about how they’re using AI, the ethics involved, and the output. Otherwise, AI could simply amplify biases that already exist in our data.

We also need to teach meta-cognition and transparency.

In learning to use AI effectively, students develop many important transferable skills. They should be able to recognize and name the skills they’re building (another argument that also applies to developing intercultural competence). For example, if students are developing critical thinking, problem-solving, or teamwork skills as they learn to use AI, educators need to help them recognize this, and make connections between what they’re doing and what might be asked of them outside that context. That’s called building meta-cognitive skills.

It’s also important to be transparent about the use of AI. Students should learn to identify how they’ve utilized AI to help solve a problem. If we’re framing the use of AI as a form of cheating in higher education, we’re unlikely to achieve that aim.

How might AI support intercultural learning, directly and/or indirectly?

This is a question I’ve been reflecting on a lot since the conference. If we as educators know we need to support and mentor students’ intercultural growth and development, how can we use AI to superpower these efforts?

As mentioned earlier, the growth of AI leads to a greater need for “soft skills” to complement AI’s technical/content capacity. I believe intercultural competence is one of those key skills (and encompasses many others, such as communication and compassion). Educators seeking to promote intercultural learning should highlight this complementarity.

The conference ended with a spirited debate where panelists took turns arguing their view on the question of ‘Human vs. Machine?’ The answer I took from the conference is yes. Both/and. AI is not going away. And it can be highly useful and make our lives better. But we need compassionate, ethical, interculturally competent critical thinkers working together to utilize all the tools at their disposal effectively and appropriately to tackle the challenges the world faces.

Higher education needs to shift away from disciplinary-focused, technical, content-based learning toward more interdisciplinary learning that helps students develop the mindsets, heart sets, and skillsets necessarily to thrive in our complex, rapidly changing, globally diverse world.

I’m curious to hear from other educators—how are you using (or considering using) AI to support intercultural learning, directly or indirectly?

For More Information

If you’re interested in international internships, and looking for a welcoming community, intimate learning experience, and thought-provoking content, check out the International Internship Conference. The next one will take place in June 2026 in Madrid, Spain.

Photo credit: Nahrizul Kadri, Unsplash