The U.S. Department of Defense says its AI use is scaling rapidly, but adoption still lags inside the workforce. Pentagon Chief Technology Officer Emil Michael told an event with the Hudson Institute that commercial AI tool usage rose from 80,000 personnel in December 2025 to 1.5 million personnel this month—about 43% of the Pentagon’s roughly 3.5 million employees. The report frames the growth alongside federal acceleration of AI use cases, citing Office of Management and Budget disclosures of more than 3,600 active or planned AI efforts last year. It also highlights how partnerships with commercial vendors—including agreements announced by GSA and operational AI partnerships—are reshaping deployment pathways in federal agencies. For higher education and student services ecosystems, the message is that even in mission-driven environments, AI rollouts can proliferate while uneven participation, output quality questions, and governance gaps remain unresolved.