WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Labor Department in March 2026 launched a seven-module AI literacy course titled "Make America AI-Ready," delivered to participants via text message. The department said the course is one of its contributions to implementing the Trump administration's AI Action Plan.

Each daily module takes under 10 minutes and begins with a lesson followed by multiple quiz questions. The curriculum covers principles for effective AI use, including considering context, specifying prompts clearly, and verifying AI outputs. Course materials describe the goal as making AI feel less like a mystery and more like a tool people want to use.

The Labor Department partnered with technology company Arist, which specializes in short text message-based courses and has worked with Etsy, the Poynter Institute, and the California governor's office. Arist delivered the course content for free as part of the White House's Pledge to America's Youth initiative without a contracting process, while the Labor Department developed the content, according to Taylor Stockton, the department's chief innovation officer.

One lesson, "Put AI to Work For You," lists chatbots from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google DeepMind and xAI, as well as other tools including DataWrapper, a data visualization tool that does not use AI. The course also links to a video titled "101 ways to use AI" that suggests asking a chatbot whether it is okay to eat a foraged mushroom. Stockton declined to answer questions about that advice. Stockton said department staff are not using the course to endorse any private companies. "We've identified a diverse number of different tools and companies that are out there that [Americans] may or may not choose to consider," Stockton said.

Craig Holman, an ethics expert at Public Citizen, said the arrangement of Arist delivering a government program without payment sounds exceedingly suspicious. Holman said the current administration has not been enforcing laws that prohibit using public resources to promote private interests. U.S. law gives the Justice Department authority to investigate and prosecute such violations.

Lauren McFerran, chair of AFL-CIO's Tech Institute and former chair of the National Labor Relations Board, questioned whether the training fits the department's mission of advancing opportunities for profitable employment. "Does this [training] make workers' jobs better or safer? Will it help people who want to find a job access high quality, union jobs?" McFerran said. "I'm not sure that teaching someone how to prompt an LLM is necessarily going to accomplish those goals."