The economic potential of generative AI — from mckinsey.com; via Superhuman

The economic potential of generative AI -- from McKinsey & Co

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On giving AI eyes and ears — from oneusefulthing.org by Ethan Mollick
AI can listen and see, with bigger implications than we might realize.

Excerpt:

But even this is just the beginning, and new modes of using AI are appearing, which further increases their capabilities. I want to show you some examples of this emerging world, which I think will soon introduce a new wave of AI use cases, and accompanying disruption.

We need to recognize that these capabilities will continue to grow, and AI will be able to play a more active role in the real world by observing and listening. The implications are likely to be profound, and we should start thinking through both the huge benefits and major concerns today.

Ethan Mollick


5 Steps to Transforming Images into Videos Using AI Tools — from heatherbcooper.substack.com by Heather Cooper
A simple guide to layering AI tools for quick video creation

5 Steps to Transforming Images into Videos Using AI Tools

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‘Nobody wins in an academic-integrity arms race’ — from chonicle.com by Ian Wilhelm
How artificial intelligence is changing the way college thing about cheating

Even though generative AI is a new thing, it doesn’t change why students cheat. They’ve always cheated for the same reason: They don’t find the work meaningful, and they don’t think they can achieve it to their satisfaction. So we need to design assessments that students find meaning in. 

Tricia Bertram Gallant


Caught off guard by AI — from chonicle.com by Beth McMurtrie and Beckie Supiano
Professor scrambled to react to ChatGPT this spring — and started planning for the fall

Excerpt:

Is it cheating to use AI to brainstorm, or should that distinction be reserved for writing that you pretend is yours? Should AI be banned from the classroom, or is that irresponsible, given how quickly it is seeping into everyday life? Should a student caught cheating with AI be punished because they passed work off as their own, or given a second chance, especially if different professors have different rules and students aren’t always sure what use is appropriate?


GPT-4 Can Use Tools Now—That’s a Big Deal — from every.to by Dan Shipper; resource via Sam DeBrule
What “function calling” is, how it works, and what it means

Excerpt:

…OpenAI built tool use right into the GPT API with an update called function calling. It’s a little like a child’s ability to ask their parents to help them with a task that they know they can’t do on their own. Except in this case, instead of parents, GPT can call out to external code, databases, or other APIs when it needs to.

Each function in function calling represents a tool that a GPT model can use when necessary, and GPT gets to decide which ones it wants to use and when. This instantly upgrades GPT capabilities—not because it can now do every task perfectly—but because it now knows how to ask for what it wants and get it.
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How ChatGPT can help disrupt assessment overload — from timeshighereducation.com by David Carless
Advances in AI are not necessarily the enemy – in fact, they should prompt long overdue consideration of assessment types and frequency, says David Carless

Excerpt:

Reducing the assessment burden could support trust in students as individuals wanting to produce worthwhile, original work. Indeed, students can be co-opted as partners in designing their own assessment tasks, so they can produce something meaningful to them.

A strategic reduction in quantity of assessment would also facilitate a refocusing of assessment priorities on deep understanding more than just performance and carries potential to enhance feedback processes.

If we were to tackle assessment overload in these ways, it opens up various possibilities. Most significantly there is potential to revitalise feedback so that it becomes a core part of a learning cycle rather than an adjunct at its end. End-of-semester, product-oriented feedback, which comes after grades have already been awarded, fails to encourage the iterative loops and spirals typical of productive learning.
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The full 12 uses are here: https://edgeoflearning.com/your-new-teaching-superpower-ai-tools/


The AI Tools in Education Database — from kiwi-path-612.notion.site by EdTech Insiders

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Since AI in education has been moving at the speed of light, we built this AI Tools in Education database to keep track of the most recent AI tools in education and the changes that are happening every day. This database is intended to be a community resource for educators, researchers, students, and other edtech specialists looking to stay up to date. This is a living document, so be sure to come back for regular updates.

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Time for Class 2023 Study finds students are earlier adopters of generative AI tools than faculty, and majority (69%) of learners prefer hybrid, blended or online course formats — from globenewswire.com by Tyton Partners

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AI Could Prevent Hiring Bias — Unless It Makes It Worse — from nerdwallet.com by Anna Helhoski
Advocates say AI can eliminate human biases in hiring. Skeptics point out that AI tools are trained by … humans.

Excerpt:

These claims conjure up the rosiest of images: human resource departments and their robot buddies solving discrimination in workplace hiring. It seems plausible, in theory, that AI could root out unconscious bias, but a growing body of research shows the opposite may be more likely.

Companies’ use of AI didn’t come out of nowhere: For example, automated applicant tracking systems have been used in hiring for decades. That means if you’ve applied for a job, your resume and cover letter were likely scanned by an automated system. You probably heard from a chatbot at some point in the process. Your interview might have been automatically scheduled and later even assessed by AI.

From DSC:
Here was my reflection on this:


Also related to AI in hiring, see:

4 in 10 Companies Will Be Using AI Interviews by 2024 — from resumebuilder.com

In June, ResumeBuilder.com surveyed more than 1,000 employees who are involved in hiring processes at their workplaces to find out about their companies’ use of AI interviews.

The results:

  • 43% of companies already have or plan to adopt AI interviews by 2024
  • Two-thirds of this group believe AI interviews will increase hiring efficiency
  • 15% say that AI will be used to make decisions on candidates without any human input
  • More than half believe AI will eventually replace human hiring managers

Watch OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on the Future of AI — from bloomberg.com
Sam Altman, CEO & Co-Founder, OpenAI discusses the explosive rise of OpenAI and its products and what an AI-laced future can look like with Bloomberg’s Emily Chang at the Bloomberg Technology Summit.

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PowerSchool Announces Collaboration with Microsoft Azure OpenAI Service to Provide Personalized Learning at Scale in K-12 Education — from powerschool.com
Large-scale language models integrated within PowerSchool Performance Matters and PowerSchool LearningNav products will empower educators in delivering transformative personalized learning pathways

The implementation of generative AI within these products will dramatically improve educators’ ability to deliver personalized learning to students at scale by enabling the application of personalized assessments and learning pathways based on individual student needs and learning goals. K-12 educators will also benefit from access to OpenAI technology…

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FETC 2023 Virtual Roundtable: How AI Will Transform K-12 Education

AI could be the great equalizer!

Holly Clark

Example screenshots:


 

AI-driven Legal Apprenticeships — from thebrainyacts.beehiiv.com by Josh Kubicki

Excerpts:

My hypothesis and research suggest that as bar associations and the ABA begin to recognize the on-going systemic issues of high-cost legal education, growing legal deserts (where no lawyer serves a given population), on-going and pervasive access to justice issues, and a public that is already weary of the legal system – alternative options that are already in play might become more supported.

What might that look like?

The combination of AI-assisted education with traditional legal apprenticeships has the potential to create a rich, flexible, and engaging learning environment. Here are three scenarios that might illustrate what such a combination could look like:

    • Scenario One – Personalized Curriculum Development
    • Scenario Two – On-Demand Tutoring and Mentoring
    • Scenario Three – AI-assisted Peer Networks and Collaborative Learning:

Why Companies Are Vastly Underprepared For The Risks Posed By AI — from forbes.com by
Accuracy, bias, security, culture, and trust are some of the risks involved

Excerpt:

We know that there are challenges – a threat to human jobs, the potential implications for cyber security and data theft, or perhaps even an existential threat to humanity as a whole. But we certainly don’t yet have a full understanding of all of the implications. In fact, a World Economic Forum report recently stated that organizations “may currently underappreciate AI-related risks,” with just four percent of leaders considering the risk level to be “significant.”

A survey carried out by analysts Baker McKenzie concluded that many C-level leaders are over-confident in their assessments of organizational preparedness in relation to AI. In particular, it exposed concerns about the potential implications of biased data when used to make HR decisions.


AI & lawyer training: How law firms can embrace hybrid learning & development — thomsonreuters.com
A big part of law firms’ successful adaptation to the increased use of ChatGPT and other forms of generative AI, may depend upon how firmly they embrace online learning & development tools designed for hybrid work environments

Excerpt:

As law firms move forward in using of advanced artificial intelligence such as ChatGPT and other forms of generative AI, their success may hinge upon how they approach lawyer training and development and what tools they enlist for the process.

One of the tools that some law firms use to deliver a new, multi-modal learning environment is an online, video-based learning platform, Hotshot, that delivers more than 250 on-demand courses on corporate, litigation, and business skills.

Ian Nelson, co-founder of Hotshot, says he has seen a dramatic change in how law firms are approaching learning & development (L&D) in the decade or so that Hotshot has been active. He believes the biggest change is that 10 years ago, firms hadn’t yet embraced the need to focus on training and development.

From DSC:
Heads up law schools. Are you seeing/hearing this!?

  • Are we moving more towards a lifelong learning model within law schools?
  • If not, shouldn’t we be doing that?
  • Are LLM programs expanding quickly enough? Is more needed?

Legal tech and innovation: 3 ways AI supports the evolution of legal ops — from lexology.com

Excerpts:

  1. Simplified legal spend analysis
  2. Faster contract review
  3. Streamlined document management

AI’s Potential for Access to Justice -- a podcast from the Legal Talk Network

 

Shocking, But Not Shocking — from onedtech.beehiiv.com by Phil Hill
Wiley announces plans to sell its OPM business

Excerpt:

Just under three months ago Pearson, one of the “Big Four” of in the Online Program Management (OPM) space, announced the sale of its OPM business. Today, another of the four is also getting out of the business (the others are Wiley, 2U/edX, and Academic Partnerships).

Why the Sale?
The immediate issue from an OPM perspective is that Wiley University Services has been losing revenue with no signs of returning to growth.

 

Trend No. 3: The business model faces a full-scale transformation — from www2.deloitte.com by Cole Clark, Megan Cluver, and Jeffrey J. Selingo
The traditional business model of higher education is broken as institutions can no longer rely on rising tuition among traditional students as the primary driver of revenue.

Excerpt:

Yet the opportunities for colleges and universities that shift their business model to a more student-centric one, serving the needs of a wider diversity of learners at different stages of their lives and careers, are immense. Politicians and policymakers are looking for solutions to the demographic cliff facing the workforce and the need to upskill and reskill generations of workers in an economy where the half-life of skills is shrinking. This intersection of needs—higher education needs students; the economy needs skilled workers—means that colleges and universities, if they execute on the right set of strategies, could play a critical role in developing the workforce of the future. For many colleges, this shift will require a significant rethinking of mission and structure as many institutions weren’t designed for workforce development and many faculty don’t believe it’s their job to get students a job. But if a set of institutions prove successful on this front, they could in the process improve the public perception of higher education, potentially leading to more political and financial support for growing this evolving business model in the future.

Also see:

Trend No. 2: The value of the degree undergoes further questioning — from www2.deloitte.com by Cole Clark, Megan Cluver, and Jeffrey J. Selingo
The perceived value of higher education has fallen as the skills needed to keep up in a job constantly change and learners have better consumer information on outcomes.

Excerpt:

Higher education has yet to come to grips with the trade-offs that students and their families are increasingly weighing with regard to obtaining a four-year degree.

But the problem facing the vast majority of colleges and universities is that they are no longer perceived to be the best source for the skills employers are seeking. This is especially the case as traditional degrees are increasingly competing with a rising tide of microcredentials, industry-based certificates, and well-paying jobs that don’t require a four-year degree.

Trend No. 1: College enrollment reaches its peak — from www2.deloitte.com by Cole Clark, Megan Cluver, and Jeffrey J. Selingo
Enrollment rates in higher education have been declining in the United States over the years as other countries catch up.

Excerpt:

Higher education in the United States has only known growth for generations. But enrollment of traditional students has been falling for more than a decade, especially among men, putting pressure both on the enrollment pipeline and on the work ecosystem it feeds. Now the sector faces increased headwinds as other countries catch up with the aggregate number of college-educated adults, with China and India expected to surpass the United States as the front runners in educated populations within the next decade or so.

Plus the other trends listed here >>


Also related to higher education, see the following items:


Number of Colleges in Distress Is Up 70% From 2012 — from bloomberg.com by Nic Querolo (behind firewall)
More schools see falling enrollement and tuition revenue | Small private, public colleges most at risk, report show

About 75% of students want to attend college — but far fewer expect to actually go — from highereddive.com by Jeremy Bauer-Wolf

There Is No Going Back: College Students Want a Live, Remote Option for In-Person Classes — from campustechnology.com by Eric Paljug

Excerpt:

Based on a survey of college students over the last three semesters, students understand that remotely attending a lecture via remote synchronous technology is less effective for them than attending in person, but they highly value the flexibility of this option of attending when they need it.

Future Prospects and Considerations for AR and VR in Higher Education Academic Technology — from er.educause.edu by Owen McGrath, Chris Hoffman and Shawna Dark
Imagining how the future might unfold, especially for emerging technologies like AR and VR, can help prepare for what does end up happening.

Black Community College Enrollment is Plummeting. How to Get Those Students Back — from the74million.org by Karen A. Stout & Francesca I. Carpenter
Stout & Carpenter: Schools need a new strategy to bolster access for learners of color who no longer see higher education as a viable pathway

As the Level Up coalition reports ,“the vast majority — 80% — of Black Americans believe that college is unaffordable.” This is not surprising given that Black families have fewer assets to pay for college and, as a result, incur significantly more student loan debt than their white or Latino peers. This is true even at the community college level. Only one-third of Black students are able to earn an associate degree without incurring debt. 

Repairing Gen Ed | Colleges struggle to help students answer the question, ‘Why am I taking this class?’ — from chronicle.com by Beth McMurtrie
Students Are Disoriented by Gen Ed. So Colleges Are Trying to Fix It.

Excerpts:

Less than 30 percent of college graduates are working in a career closely related to their major, and the average worker has 12 jobs in their lifetime. That means, he says, that undergraduates must learn to be nimble and must build transferable skills. Why can’t those skills and ways of thinking be built into general education?

“Anyone paying attention to the nonacademic job market,” he writes, “will know that skills, rather than specific majors, are the predominant currency.”

Micro-credentials Survey. 2023 Trends and Insights. — from holoniq.com
HolonIQ’s 2023 global survey on micro-credentials

3 Keys to Making Microcredentials Valid for Learners, Schools, and Employers — from campustechnology.com by Dave McCool
To give credentials value in the workplace, the learning behind them must be sticky, visible, and scalable.

Positive Partnership: Creating Equity in Gateway Course Success — from insidehighered.com by Ashley Mowreader
The Gardner Institute’s Courses and Curricula in Urban Ecosystems initiative works alongside institutions to improve success in general education courses.

American faith in higher education is declining: one poll — from bryanalexander.org by Bryan Alexander

Excerpt:

The main takeaway is that our view of higher education’s value is souring.  Fewer of us see post-secondary learning as worth the cost, and now a majority think college and university degrees are no longer worth it: “56% of Americans think earning a four-year degree is a bad bet compared with 42% who retain faith in the credential.”

Again, this is all about one question in one poll with a small n. But it points to directions higher ed and its national setting are headed in, and we should think hard about how to respond.


 

PricewaterhouseCoopers to Pour $1 Billion Into Generative AI — from wsj.com by Angus Loten
Multiyear investment in U.S. business includes accessing ChatGPT maker OpenAI’s language model, training staff in AI capabilities

Excerpt:

PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP plans to invest $1 billion in generative artificial intelligence technology in its U.S. operations over the next three years, working with Microsoft Corp. and ChatGPT-maker OpenAI to automate aspects of its tax, audit and consulting services.

The accounting and consulting giant said the multiyear investment, announced Wednesday, includes funding to recruit more AI workers and train existing staff in AI capabilities, while targeting AI software makers for potential acquisitions.

For PwC, the goal isn’t only to develop and embed generative AI into its own technology stack and client-services platforms, but also advising other companies on how best to use generative AI, while helping them build those tools, said Mohamed Kande, PwC’s vice chair and co-leader of U.S. consulting solutions and global advisory leader.

 
 

The top online learning statistics in 2023 — from Devlin Peck’s Online Learning Statistics: The Ultimate List in 2023

  • Worldwide, 49% of students have completed some sort of online learning
  • Online learning is the fastest-growing market in the education industry – it has grown 900% since its creation in 2000
  • 70% of students say online learning is better than traditional classroom learning
  • The number of online learning users is expected to increase to 57 million by 2027
  • 80% of businesses now offer online learning or training solutions
  • 63% of students in the US engage in online learning activities daily
  • Online learning can increase student and employee retention to as much as 50%
  • Online learning can reduce the time needed to learn a subject by 40% to 60%
  • The online learning industry is projected to be worth more than $370 billion by 2026
  • Online learning and training can improve employee performance by 15% to 25%

Trade programs — unlike other areas of higher education — are in hot demand — from hechingerreport.org by Olivia Sanchez
Many young people choose to pursue short-term credentials over traditional college because they see them as a quicker and a more affordable path to a good

Excerpt:

While almost every sector of higher education is seeing fewer students registering for classes, many trade school programs are booming. Jones and his classmates, seeking certificates and other short-term credentials, not associate degrees, are part of that upswing.

Mechanic and repair trade programs saw an enrollment increase of 11.5 percent from spring 2021 to 2022, according to the National Student Clearinghouse. Enrollment in construction trades courses increased by 19.3 percent, while culinary program enrollment increased 12.7 percent, according to the Clearinghouse.


Death of a Traditional Lecture — from by

Excerpts:

However, some of the digital/remote content is better than what we can provide in the physical classroom. For example, in a biology course, instructors can watch students interact with thousands of 3D models, such as those found on Sketchfab or virtual programs such as BioDigital. Additionally, students can follow along virtually as instructors point out different structures. This approach is not possible in a physical classroom unless each student has their own physical model or they bring their computers.

We should welcome the unfamiliarity of new and blended course designs and strive to build courses based on the best approach for the content regardless of the format, rather than revert to the comfort of analog lecturing.


How College Students Say They Learn Best— from insidehighered.com by Colleen Flaherty
In a new Student Voice survey, students share their preferences for class format, active learning strategies and note-taking. Interactive lectures and case studies are especially popular.


OPM Market Landscape And Dynamics: Spring 2023 Updates — from philhillaa.com by Phil Hill

Excerpt:

OPM Market Landscape

  • Market valuations of publicly-traded OPM companies have continued to drop, with 2U/edX, Coursera, and Keypath all down 75% or more from March 2021.
  • Pearson tapped out of the market, agreeing to sell its OPM business to private equity firm Regent.
  • Zovio is no more. It has ceased to be.
  • FutureLearn sold the remnants of its business to a for-profit system, and it now has the most obnoxious website of any OPM provider, past or present.
  • Byju’s, which (according to multiple media accounts) had been considering an acquisition of 2U/edX or Coursera, abandoned these plans to go off and deal with its own financial crisis.
  • Noodle acquired South Africa-based Hubble Studios.
  • The Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report on the OPM market, triggering (but not causing) official efforts to make massive regulatory changes.

Harvard and MIT Launch Nonprofit to Increase College Access — from edsurge.com by Jeffrey R. Young
The effort is backed by the $800 million sale of the online platform edX in 2021.

Excerpt:

What would you do if you had $800 million to build a new nonprofit to support innovation in online learning?

That’s the privileged question that officials at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University have been mulling over for the last two years, and late last month they announced some answers.

The result is a new nonprofit named Axim Collaborative, and its focus will be on serving learners that higher education has historically left behind.

As the group’s new CEO, Stephanie Khurana, put it in an interview with EdSurge this week: “The focus of the mission is to really help postsecondary completion and issues of economic mobility.”


California helps college students cut their debt by paying them to help their communities — from hechingerreport.org by Gail Cornwall
Inspired by service programs from earlier eras, the College Corps program puts low-income, first-generation students to work in education, food insecurity and climate mitigation


‘The reckoning is here’: More than a third of community college students have vanished — from hechingerreport.org by Jon Marcus
Among those who do enroll, red tape and a lack of support are crushing their ambition


The Importance of Student Agency and Self-Direction — from evolllution.com by Cathrael Kazin

Excerpt:

The traditional higher education model is not a one-size-fits all. And students are increasingly calling for adaptability and flexibility to meet their needs. The focus on student agency is a tactic that many leaders can leverage when looking to support these needs and thrive moving forward. In this interview, Cathrael Kazin discusses the need for student agency and self-direction, the challenges that come with it and how to improve student retention and success.

 

From DSC:
Regarding the core curricula of colleges and universities…

For decades now, faculty members have taught what they wanted to teach and what interested them. They taught what they wanted to research vs. what the wider marketplace/workplace needed. They were not responsive to the needs of the workplace — nor to the needs of their students!

And this situation has been all the more compounded by the increasing costs of obtaining a degree plus the exponential pace of change. We weren’t doing a good job before this exponential pace of change started taking place — and now it’s (almost?) impossible to keep up.

The bottom line on the article below: ***It’s sales.***

Therefore, it’s about what you are selling — and at what price. The story hasn’t changed much. The narrative (i.e., the curricula and more) is pretty much the same thing that’s been sold for years.

But the days of faculty members teaching whatever they wanted to are over, or significantly waning.

Faculty members, faculty senates, provosts, presidents, and accreditors are reaping what they’ve sown.

The questions are now:

  • Will new seeds be sown?
  • Will new crops arise in the future?
  • Will there be new narratives?
  • Will institutions be able to reinvent themselves (one potential example here)? Or will their cultures not allow such significant change to take place? Will alternatives to institutions of traditional higher education continue to pick up steam?

A Profession on the Edge — from chronicle.com by Eric Hoover
Why enrollment leaders are wearing down, burning out, and leaving jobs they once loved.

Excerpts:

Similar stories are echoing throughout the hallways of higher education. Vice presidents for enrollment, as well as admissions deans and directors, are wearing down, burning out, and leaving jobs they once loved. Though there’s no way to compile a chart quantifying the churn, industry insiders describe it as significant. “We’re at an inflection point,” says Rick Clark, executive director of undergraduate admission at Georgia Tech. “There have always been people leaving the field, but not in the numbers we’re seeing now.”

Some are being shoved out the door by presidents and boards. Some are resigning out of exhaustion, frustration, and disillusionment. And some who once sought top-level positions are rethinking their ambitions. “The pressures have ratcheted up tenfold,” says Angel B. Pérez, chief executive of the National Association for College Admission Counseling, known as NACAC. “I talk with someone each week who’s either leaving the field or considering leaving.”


From DSC:
This quote points to what I’m trying to address here:

Dahlstrom and other veterans of the field say they’ve experienced something especially disquieting: an erosion of faith in the transformational power of higher education. Though she sought a career in admissions to help students, her disillusionment grew after taking on a leadership role. She became less confident that she was equipped to effect positive changes, at her institution or beyond, especially when it came to the challenge of expanding college access in a nation of socioeconomic disparities: “I felt like a cog in a huge machine that’s not working, yet continues to grind while only small, temporary fixes are made.”

 

From DSC:
Before we get to Scott Belsky’s article, here’s an interesting/related item from Tobi Lutke:


Our World Shaken, Not Stirred: Synthetic entertainment, hybrid social experiences, syncing ourselves with apps, and more. — from implications.com by Scott Belsky
Things will get weird. And exciting.

Excerpts:

Recent advances in technology will stir shake the pot of culture and our day-to-day experiences. Examples? A new era of synthetic entertainment will emerge, online social dynamics will become “hybrid experiences” where AI personas are equal players, and we will sync ourselves with applications as opposed to using applications.

A new era of synthetic entertainment will emerge as the world’s video archives – as well as actors’ bodies and voices – will be used to train models. Expect sequels made without actor participation, a new era of ai-outfitted creative economy participants, a deluge of imaginative media that would have been cost prohibitive, and copyright wars and legislation.

Unauthorized sequels, spin-offs, some amazing stuff, and a legal dumpster fire: Now lets shift beyond Hollywood to the fast-growing long tail of prosumer-made entertainment. This is where entirely new genres of entertainment will emerge including the unauthorized sequels and spinoffs that I expect we will start seeing.


Also relevant/see:

Digital storytelling with generative AI: notes on the appearance of #AICinema — from bryanalexander.org by Bryan Alexander

Excerpt:

This is how I viewed a fascinating article about the so-called #AICinema movement.  Benj Edwards describes this nascent current and interviews one of its practitioners, Julie Wieland.  It’s a great example of people creating small stories using tech – in this case, generative AI, specifically the image creator Midjourney.

Bryan links to:

Artists astound with AI-generated film stills from a parallel universe — from arstechnica.com by Benj Edwards
A Q&A with “synthographer” Julie Wieland on the #aicinema movement.

An AI-generated image from an #aicinema still series called Vinyl Vengeance by Julie Wieland, created using Midjourney.


From DSC:
How will text-to-video impact the Learning and Development world? Teaching and learning? Those people communicating within communities of practice? Those creating presentations and/or offering webinars?

Hmmm…should be interesting!


 

Why some college professors are adopting ChatGPT AI as quickly as students — from cnbc.com by Carolyn Chun

Key Points:

  • A recent analysis by researchers at NYU, Princeton and the Wharton School finds that many of the jobs that will be most “exposed” to generative AI such as ChatGPT are in the college teaching profession.
  • One of the first narratives to emerge from the sudden explosion in usage of ChatGPT is the risk of students cheating on writing assignments.
  • But use by college teachers is growing quickly too, and adoption by educators may be critical to making the case that AI will augment the jobs humans are doing rather than replace them.

Also relevant/see:


 


Also relevant/see:

 

ANALYSIS: ‘Microcredentials’ poised to disrupt higher ed as degrees lose relevance to employers — from campusreform.org by Shelby Kearns; with thanks to Ray Schroeder on LinkedIn for this resource

Key points:

  • Survey respondents are demonstrating confidence in microcredentials–online training programs that take no more than six months to complete–as four-year degree programs often overlook job training.
  • ‘Grade inflation and efforts to help everyone … attend college make it harder for employers to differentiate among applicants.’
 

From DSC:
While I continue to try and review/pulse-check the K12 learning ecosystem, it struck me that we need new, DIRECT communication channels between educators, support staff, administrators, and legislators — and possibly others.

That is:

  • How can teachers, support staff, and administrators talk directly to legislators?
  • How can legislators communicate with teachers, support staff, and administrators?
  • Should we require relevant legislators (i.e., those individuals sponsoring bills or major changes to our k12 learning ecosystem) to go through training on how students learn?
  • What communication vehicles are present? Can they be anonymous?
  • Should there be an idea 1-800 hotline or an idea “mailbox” (digital and/or analog based)?

And what about the students themselves and/or their parents/guardians? Should they be involved as well?

 

Law has a magic wand now — from jordanfurlong.substack.com by Jordan Furlong
Some people think Large Language Models will transform the practice of law. I think it’s bigger than that.

Excerpts:

ChatGPT4 can also do things that only lawyers (used to be able to) do. It can look up and summarize a court decisionanalyze and apply sections of copyright law, and generate a statement of claim for breach of contract.

What happens when you introduce a magic wand into the legal market? On the buyer side, you reduce by a staggering degree the volume of tasks that you need to pay lawyers (whether in-house or outside counsel) to perform. It won’t happen overnight: Developing, testing, revising, approving, and installing these sorts of systems in corporations will take time. But once that’s done, the beauty of LLMs like ChatGPT4 is that they are not expert systems. Anyone can use them. Anyone will.

But I can’t shake the feeling that someday, we’ll divide the history of legal services into “Before GPT4” and “After GPT4.” I think it’s that big.


From DSC:
Jordan mentions: “Some people think Large Language Models will transform the practice of law. I think it’s bigger than that.”

I agree with Jordan. It most assuredly IS bigger than that. AI will profoundly impact many industries/disciplines. The legal sector is but one of them. Education is another. People’s expectations are now changing — and the “ramification wheels” are now in motion.

I take the position that many others have as well (at least as of this point in time) that take the position that AI will supplement humans’ capabilities and activities. But those who know AI-driven apps will outcompete those who don’t know about such apps. 

 

Planning for AGI and beyond — from OpenAI.org by Sam Altman

Excerpt:

There are several things we think are important to do now to prepare for AGI.

First, as we create successively more powerful systems, we want to deploy them and gain experience with operating them in the real world. We believe this is the best way to carefully steward AGI into existence—a gradual transition to a world with AGI is better than a sudden one. We expect powerful AI to make the rate of progress in the world much faster, and we think it’s better to adjust to this incrementally.

A gradual transition gives people, policymakers, and institutions time to understand what’s happening, personally experience the benefits and downsides of these systems, adapt our economy, and to put regulation in place. It also allows for society and AI to co-evolve, and for people collectively to figure out what they want while the stakes are relatively low.

*AGI stands for Artificial General Intelligence

 
© 2024 | Daniel Christian