Teachers care about teaching and learning, not AI

As we have since the beginning, we've been talking to a lot of teachers lately. And here's what they've been telling us: 

They don't care about AI. They care about teaching and learning.

Here's our own Levi Belnap on District Administration's "Talking out of School" podcast:

“Instead of using AI like it’s going to solve all problems, we see AI as a component of how we can build effective classroom solutions. We bring it in to our voice interaction system so teachers can talk and get responses. You can also generate lesson content. But it’s this complete system in the classroom that leads to better engagement and frees teachers.

What we’re hearing from our educators is that they don’t really care if it’s gen AI or not. They just say, "Is this helping me do what I need to do in a classroom?"

Here's what a couple of teachers told us:

• "There’s no back row now. I’m everywhere with my students, and it feels like the people in the back row are just as engaged as the people in front."

• Another middle school teacher said, "I learned that when I’m present, I don’t have as many behavioral challenges. ... Instead we’re learning."

“When you bring in gen AI in ways that accomplish those goals," says Levi, "you end up immediately impacting learning in the classroom.”