Americans have done a shoddy job of teaching reading and math to the majority of our students. Our scores, when compared to other nations—most with fewer resources—are plummeting.
As a scientist, I try to stay solution oriented. To ensure that we bend the curve and change the future, we must first concede that we have failed our students. We’re at the dawn of a new educational era—the age of artificial intelligence. And there is no way we will get it right in this new era if we are still struggling with the previous one.
As a congenital optimist, I am hopeful that when it comes to teaching AI—I mean this in its broadest sense, well beyond the practice of coding—that we will learn from our mistakes and get it right this time.
My genetic positivity is reinforced by two recent developments that are important milestones in building a national consensus for assuring that we create generational AI skills and wisdom.
The White House’s executive order
Trump’s executive order speaks directly to the existential need for our country to “cultivate the skills and understanding to use and create the next generation of AI technology.” Upon its issuance, I wrote a column commending its intention. But I also noted, speaking as president and CEO of the Center of Science and Industry (COSI), a board member of the National Academies of Sciences, and a lifelong STEM advocate, that the EO was insufficient: We cannot teach AI without also teaching critical thinking, ethics, and wisdom.
Since then, I was asked to participate in the White House Task Force on AI Education that is guiding the implementation of the EO, and is also establishing public-private partnerships with leading stakeholders in AI. COSI is part of this group and we have signed on to President Trump’s pledge to invest in AI education.
I recently attended a meeting of the White House Task Force on AI Education, where the inexorable link between national security, economic prosperity, and AI proficiency was the dominant theme. I would summarize it as: “We need to win—and we must be the global leader in AI capabilities to keep America on top.”
Yes—but how?
The state of Ohio creates a new state of tomorrow
After the meeting, I returned to Ohio, which has joined the AI conversation in a big way. Ohio is the first state to require that every school district adopt formal policies to govern AI use in schools.
To put it simply, the EO urges the must—that AI education needs to be a priority. The Ohio regulation, by contrast, insists on the how. It proceeds from the recognition that our schools will be teaching the technology of the future, and demands that the complex nuances of how be determined and agreed to.
Chris Woolard, the chief integration officer at the Ohio Department of Education, described the challenge as creating new “guardrails” that include ground rules for privacy, data quality, ethical use, and academic honesty. And, importantly, “What are the critical thinking skills that are needed for students.”
Beyond just governed, to taught
I commend what Ohio has done. But there is a long way to go.
To build foundational pedagogical techniques for the teaching of AI, with no baseline, no historical data, and no trials, is far from trivial. In fact, it is enormously complicated, as we have seen from our inability to effectively teach STEM. Ohio’s regulatory framework, which other states should follow, will involve the creation of new practices and metrics and will require vast sensitivity and nuance, given that every single aspect of education can be weaponized in our undeniably fraught world of culture wars.
But we can learn from our mistakes. For example, so-called whole language—versus phonics—is ineffective for the 20% of children with dyslexia. We need to bring all children into the future, and to do that we need to assure that AI literacy becomes a core marker of educational success. Interestingly enough, AI can help with this
Teaching AI is like developing AI. Sort of
The rapid evolution of AI comes from the process of “training the model”; it is how the large language models (LLMs) learn and improve in an iterative and focused manner. But it is also a black box in many ways, which cannot be the case with how we teach AI in our schools. Only transparency and continual improvement will ensure that our K-12 students develop the skills necessary to succeed in a changing workforce.
None of this will be easy. AI represents a profound turning point; the EO is broad and conceptual, while our Constitution assigns the responsibility of education to the states. But nothing can be more important, and I call upon educators everywhere to come together and work together.
What makes their mission even more challenging is that AI is changing all the time, and with such speed. So those teaching it must also be capable of commensurate change. But educational standards tend to be fixed. It is hard enough to set them, let alone to build in agility and responsiveness.
I look forward to working with educators, continuing to participate with the AI Task Force, to help develop standards and guardrails that are as responsive and dynamic as artificial intelligence itself. Indeed, the time is now.
The early-rate deadline for Fast Company’s World Changing Ideas Awards is Friday, November 14, at 11:59 p.m. PT. Apply today.
