Artificial intelligence has ended the era when universities existed to transmit knowledge, and institutions that fail to redefine their purpose risk becoming obsolete.

That was the stark warning from University of Cape Coast Chancellor Sam Jonah during the installation of Professor John Aheto as the university’s new Vice-Chancellor on Friday, August 1.

Delivering a speech on the theme “We Hold the Pen: The University in the Age of Answers,” Mr Jonah argued that AI has fundamentally changed higher education by making knowledge instantly accessible.

“For the first time in human history, the cleverest entity in the room may not be a person,” he said.

“The scarcity of answers is over. We now live in the Age of Answers — where answers are abundant, instant, and nearly free.”

He challenged universities to rethink their mission, saying the traditional role of transmitting knowledge was no longer enough in a world where machines outperform humans at recalling information.

“So I must ask the question that will define your tenure, Vice-Chancellor, and the future of every university on this continent: what is a university for, when the library talks back?”

“If our answer is: ‘to transmit knowledge’ — then we are finished, because a machine now does that better, faster and cheaper than we ever will.”

He argued that universities must instead focus on developing qualities that machines cannot replicate.

“But if our answer is: ‘to form human beings who can do what no machine can do’ — then, ladies and gentlemen, the university is about to enter its greatest century.”

Mr Jonah also criticised an education system that rewards memorisation instead of practical ability.

“Too many of our graduates leave university having memorised much and built little,” he said.

“The world our graduates are entering will not ask them what they know. It will ask them what they can do.”

He warned that Africa’s development would remain stalled if universities continued producing graduates with theoretical knowledge but limited practical competence.

“Knowledge of a thing is not the ability to do the thing. And a nation of people who know, but cannot do, will remain a poor nation — beautifully certificated, and poor.”

Rejecting claims that artificial intelligence would eliminate all jobs, Mr Jonah said technology would instead increase the value of human skills.

“AI will take every job that consists of knowing things — and it will multiply the value of every job that consists of doing things in the physical world and caring for people in the human world.”

He stressed that no technology could replace human judgment, empathy or skilled manual work.

“The great irony of our age is this: the more artificial the world becomes, the more precious the human becomes.”

Mr Jonah urged African universities to stop copying models developed elsewhere and instead build institutions that respond to the continent’s own realities.

“We must not merely update a model designed elsewhere and call it progress. We must build institutions conceived in Africa and led from Africa.”

Ending with a challenge to the new Vice-Chancellor and the university community, he said institutions that embrace change would shape the future, while those that resist it would become irrelevant.

“The old model of the university is passing. A new one is waiting to be built. Someone will build it. Let it be built here, by us.”