Indiana University is making its popular AI literacy course, known as GenAI 101, completely free and open to the public, offering an AI skills badge from the Kelley School of Business with no application or tuition. The university says demand from corporations, small businesses, state agencies, and other institutions outpaced the original enrollment model. The decision positions AI fluency as a workforce-access issue rather than a paid credential. Indiana’s faculty also cited McKinsey reporting on company AI investment plans and the World Economic Forum’s forecast that employers expect AI and information processing technologies to transform business by 2030. In higher education, the rollout is notable because it treats an assessed competency credential as a public-good offering, potentially pressuring peer institutions that monetize similar AI literacy modules. The key operational change is that a major public university is expanding learning distribution beyond enrolled students, using badge issuance to signal workforce readiness while removing tuition barriers.