ISLAMABAD, (APP – UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News – 3rd Sep, 2026) The National academy of Higher Education (NAHE), Higher Education Commission (HEC) Pakistan, has concluded a four-day faculty training programme titled, “AI Literacy for Educators: Building AI-Ready Institutions,” for Lecturers and Assistant Professors serving in public sector higher education institutions (HEIs).
Thirty-two faculty members representing public sector HEIs from Islamabad and Rawalpindi attended the training in person at HEC Smart Classroom alongside more than 300 faculty members participating in the programme through university-based Smart Classrooms and Video Conference Rooms.
The programme, organised through the Smart Classroom, was designed to strengthen faculty’s capacity to understand, critically evaluate, and integrate Artificial Intelligence into teaching, learning, research, assessment, and broader academic practices.
The comprehensive professional development intervention combined conceptual understanding, practical hands-on learning, critical reflection, and the application of AI across diverse academic contexts, enabling participants to develop both foundational knowledge and practical skills.
A distinctive feature of the programme was its technology-enabled delivery through HEC Smart Classroom network as majority of the faculty members joined the training programme online from their respective universities. This arrangement allowed participants to attend live sessions in real time and engage directly with the resource person, making the sessions interactive despite distance.
Managing Director NAHE Dr. Noor Amna Malik attended the closing ceremony as chief guest.
She highlighted the transformative impact of AI on higher education, noting that AI is rapidly reshaping the ways knowledge is created, taught, assessed, researched, and applied. She urged universities to prepare faculty members and students to effectively navigate an AI-enabled academic environment while ensuring that technological advancement remains firmly grounded in academic quality, ethical principles, human judgment, and institutional responsibility. She underlined that AI literacy for educators extends far beyond the ability to operate AI tools.
Dr. Malik highlighted the importance of developing a critical understanding of AI systems, including their capabilities, limitations, and implications for academic work. She also emphasised the need for faculty members to uphold academic integrity, critically evaluate AI-generated outputs, safeguard privacy and intellectual property, and maintain appropriate human oversight in teaching, assessment, research, and academic decision-making. She stressed the importance of developing AI-ready institutions, noting that the meaningful integration of AI requires capable faculty, institutional preparedness, effective governance mechanisms, ethical safeguards, and continuous professional development.
The participants received extensive practical exposure to the use of AI in curriculum and course design, lesson planning, teaching resource development, academic writing, research support, assessment design, student feedback, data analytics, communication, and professional productivity. The participants also explored contemporary AI tools and learned the principles of prompt engineering and effective human-AI interaction.
