President Capilouto: ‘Our mission never changes: We exist to advance Kentucky in everything we do’

LEXINGTON, Ky. (Feb. 25, 2026) — The following remarks were made by President Eli Capilouto at the February University of Kentucky Board of Trustees meeting. 

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As many times as we have experienced severe weather, I’m still overwhelmed and astounded by the numbers. Winter Storm Fern was no different.

Around-the-clock crews in multiple shifts dedicated to our campus community’s safety — that’s what I got to witness again. Nearly 800 rides provided to caregivers and other essential personnel. Thousands of feet of parking lots and sidewalks plowed. Nearly 400 tons of salt spread across hundreds of acres — then treated again and again.

Thousands of meals served to students and workers, tired from the cold, exhausted from their efforts to keep us safe. Dozens of employees working at all hours to keep open essential facilities that support our students and extend care to those who need it most.

In the most brutal of conditions, our people step up to protect what matters most: our students, our patients, one another and our purpose… our 160-year-old mission to advance this state in everything we do.

I know you join me in thanking them for their resilience and commitment.

And their work reminds me of something else. As predictions of more or less snow or greater or lesser amounts of ice surfaced, our priorities never, ever changed. But our plans had to.

How many rides for health care workers would be needed, and when and on what shifts? How would we make sure they were supported with equipment, clothing, gear and food? Where, how and when would we deploy salt and treatment to roads, sidewalks and parking lots?

As we tried to predict incoming weather, how would we assess whether to close, for how long and then when to open? But our principles remained fixed: keep our people healthy and safe, prioritize the care of our patients and, as always in these cases, we ask: how do we return as quickly as possible to normal operations?

Our plans for achieving our goals had to quickly adapt, we had to be flexible and agile. And in many ways, the storm is more than a memory…it’s a metaphor for where we find ourselves today. Our mission never changes. We exist to advance Kentucky in everything we do. But how we get there must be responsive to the moment, the time and the people we serve.

Three questions strike me as particularly relevant to that end. As we worked our way out of the bad weather, and as I prepared for my testimony in front of the House committee to examine our budget, I thought of those three questions:

• Are we being accountable to ourselves and others?
• What will the support we are provided from our fellow citizens yield for Kentucky?
• Are our universities providing something relevant — not only from yesterday that we can point to with great pride, but more so tomorrow and long into the future that we know is going to continually change so, so rapidly.

Those are some of the questions we ask ourselves and prepare to give examples to our legislators to them know we are working to answer these questions positively. I shared with them that many people think and assume that every unit needs everything.

But we need one overarching IT department not a dozen. One unit to promote and tell the institution’s story which is, in so many ways, Kentucky’s story. One roof under which we can bring areas such as dining, facilities and groundskeeping together.

More efficient operations can yield even more effectiveness. So, we are consolidating services, improving efficiency and effectiveness and trying to be more transparent by sharing contracts, travel and partnership information that we publish regularly.

We are getting efficient because we will continue to grow and as our employees will be asked to do more, we must provide the space and resources for them to excel in their areas — in what they do best and to make their work even more enjoyable.

A demographic cliff where the country will experience a decline in numbers of traditional college-aged students is not on the horizon…it began in 2008.

The trend has continued ever since, and it will continue. You can see it in enrollments across the country.

But thanks to so many on this campus — and you’ve witnessed their collective work — faculty and staff come together and support our students with an outstanding education that prepares them for a life of meaning and purpose.

And consequently, we have bucked those enrollment trends. But if demography is destiny, how do we best prepare for — and compete in — that future? And how do we do so in the best interest of our Commonwealth?

In some quarters, the traditional understanding of what a college degree means as a necessary ticket to that first job and a lifetime of stronger earnings, is being questioned and doubted. Now, oftentimes, we have pointed to comparison between someone with a college degree and someone without. Looking back over the last 30 years, you compare those two individuals and there’s a million-dollar difference in earned income.

But as I’ve been reminded recently, that’s historic and it’s an average. Our legislators are starting to pay attention to this for the people they represent. You look closely at more recent data — Americans with a bachelor’s degree, especially men, account for a quarter of the unemployed. That, too, is a record.

High school graduates are finding jobs, in many cases, quicker than college grads. That is an unprecedented trend. And occupations susceptible to AI automation have seen sharp spikes and joblessness.

As one commentator who works in AI recently wrote: “In 2022, AI couldn't do basic arithmetic reliably. It would confidently tell you that 7 × 8 = 54. By 2023, it could pass the bar exam. By 2024, it could write working software and explain graduate-level science. By late 2025, some of the best engineers in the world said they had handed over most of their coding work to AI. On Feb. 5, 2026, new models arrived that made everything before them feel like a different era. If you haven't tried AI in the last few months, what exists today would be unrecognizable to you.”

Our vice president for research, her office sponsors CURATE — a great lunch and learn. People who have had many, many small grants undertake great research projects.

This week, when those were featured, there was one professor in law who had decided, “gee, can we have a 24/7 academic advisement?” And he described this evolution of AI because he started his project two or three years ago. He had almost programmed AI to be a modern tutor, but he said that for the more recent models, you don’t have to do that.

He did a pre-test and a post-test and showed that AI, in that particular area, could be an effective tutor available around the clock. And you’ve heard examples of this throughout our meetings today. Our students understand the continually changing nature of the economy. And, they are adapting.

So, here’s information I asked for this week: consider the fact that in 2010 and 2011, across every degree from the undergraduate to doctoral level, only nine students chose to pursue a credential or a certificate. Last year, that number was 1,300.

In that first year of nine people, one degree awardee earned multiple certificates. Last year, 91 of those 1,300 earned two or more. So, these degrees and certificates are becoming stackable in many ways as people try to prepare for the job market.

What does this mean?

It means our students know that one degree in one discipline of a fairly narrow field of study may not necessarily prepare them for a career where technology heralds swift and dramatic change — frequently in very unexpected ways. So, they’re seeking additional skills and credentials that signal to employers that their skills, both broad and specific, are going to meet the moment.

We have to ask ourselves, are we making that easy for students to do? Or is it too challenging to navigate? We must future-proof our students, preparing them not just for their first job, but for careers that will evolve and constantly challenge them and our economy.

Weeks ago, our Stanley and Karen Pigman College of Engineering launched the state’s first Bachelor of Science in AI, with the inaugural class arriving in fall 2026. AI and machine learning specialists are projected to be the third fastest-growing occupation globally over the next five years.

We must move quickly to meet this growing demand. Our employees must be equipped to use these tools effectively if we’re asking them to do more. And as I’ve read recently, AI is best at taking the drudgery out of work, giving you the time for what you most enjoy.

We also must understand how to leverage AI to extend healing to more places and enhance the patience experience. You heard that from our physician in the video but what was most moving to me was the last student you heard in the video. Jonathan from Spencer County who is working on access to care. You can learn most about a person and what they care about by the questions they choose to answer. So, Jonathan and his fellow students were particularly inspiring to me.

We are among the first universities in the country to partner with Microsoft in a comprehensive way across every sector of our campus so more faculty, staff and students can leverage this innovation to solve Kentucky’s problems. And, like Jonathan, solve the problem in his home county.

We are laying the groundwork for a physical presence of Microsoft with us. Faculty have been and will continue to partner with Microsoft to deliver tailored training for students and employees and to extend this opportunity to our partners in the Advancing Kentucky Together Network.

Our IT teams are collaborating to provide engineering expertise supporting the customization of AI tools across research, care, teaching and service. And as you heard Dr. Bob DiPaola describe, we officially launched the faculty and staff version of the TEK 100 foundational AI literacy course, ensuring it is available to all employees through Canvas. And we will host, a campuswide Microsoft event with engagement zones ranging from AI and ethics to showcasing technologies, including complex models built by our very own students.

As policymakers examine how to fund us in the future, increasingly enrolling and graduating more students isn’t seen as solely sufficient. They want us to ensure that our students and our state are prepared to compete — that they secure jobs that pay well and provide dignity and are prepared to succeed in an economy that changes at such a rapid pace. Because they want what we want — a healthier, wealthier and wiser Kentucky.

Our campus must be organized around — and oriented toward — building Kentucky’s future workforce in ways that align with what we’re seeing and that I’ve just described.

In the coming weeks, I will announce a campuswide initiative around workforce and career development. It will entail a greater focus on how we partner together across disciplines to be responsive to workforce needs to ensure more opportunities for career development while students are with us and to prepare them with the skills and capabilities they will need to adapt. It is an extension of what you have charged us with — to accelerate our progress in advancing the economy, health and well-being of the state.

Too much of higher education, for too long, has been a system focused on us, as supplier, not the student and community as the customer. More often, especially when I meet with the people’s representatives, they share that we sometimes are starting with a perspective of the supplier and provider that delivers education in accord with maybe a focus on our schedules. They’re asking me how we’re going to focus more from the perspective of the customer, their community and the students who come from their hometowns who they send to us.

I assure them that we are going to double down on their need, and we’re going to array our talent, time, treasure, offerings and service to meet the moment.

Consider my example of the growth of these additional credentials and the multiple certificates students seek. A student who comes to us today and wants to work in a field like sports administration, will need credits and skills earned across several colleges and disciplines — sports management, finance, law, philanthropy, digital marketing, communications and many others. How can we weave that educational experience together for them and make it easy to achieve competencies? A degree from one college and one program may not be enough to prepare students for the workplace, much less one rapidly changing year to year, or even month to month.

I want to thank the Alumni Association. I had the delight this year of going to our Great Teachers dinner before they were introduced on the basketball court. And as one of the recipients said, we should change the name of that to Great Teachers and Great Students. That individual was nominated by three students. And I love what we offer here in the traditional ways and the nontraditional ways. I went around the room and talked to students and faculty, and I met three students of an outstanding oboe professor.

I asked them what they were doing next. Two of them were using their oboe experience to prepare them best for law school. One was going on into music, and the student who sat next to me is a marketing major. But here at UK, one of the things she’s participating in and leading is the marketing around DanceBlue. That had exposed her to the DanceBlue Clinic, where we’re treating and taking care of families whose children are facing this dreaded disease. She’s now interested in health care.

We have a 12-hour health care management certificate that I’m not sure she knew about. So, how can we prepare someone like that who discovers a new passion, for a career that’s going to be so meaningful?

We need to better understand where the economy is going and what fields are emerging and increasing? And what are they going to require of our students in terms of skills and capacity? We need to help our students more easily understand these pathways so that they can gain the education tailored to them, not just us and what we are used to doing.

This is not to dismiss the progress we have made at your direction.

It is astounding in terms of what we’ve done to treat more, educate and graduate more students. And that record gives me confidence that we are going to respond…it is a recognition that our work must revolve around Kentucky and what Kentucky needs.

That has always been our North Star…our purpose has not changed, but the path we must follow probably will.

I hope you realize how much Kentucky depends on us…our growth as an economic engine, our capacity to extend healing to more people through care and discovery…and our commitment to preparing our students for careers and lives of meaning and purpose. But there are questions we must answer now and they are not easy — and in a moment of change and challenge we must meet them if we are to be Kentucky’s trusted partner for progress into the future.

This is our moment to prove — once again — that Kentucky’s university is built for Kentucky’s future. And if we adapt with the same discipline, flexibility, agility, commitment and clarity we showed during that storm, Kentucky will be stronger for it.