Why Teachers Quit + What You Can Do Instead — from devlinpeck.com by Devlin Peck

Today we’ll dive into the main reasons behind why teachers quit and signs to look for if you’re considering quitting teaching too.

Instructional design
Instructional design is the process of developing learning experiences for higher education, the corporate world, or for organizations such as non-profits. Many teachers transition into the field because of overlapping tasks that allow you to continue teaching, all while learning a new skill set. But instructional design also offers:

  • Higher rates of pay than teaching. Instructional design is a better paid industry than teaching. You can also work when and where you like.
  • Better work-life balance. 94% of instructional designers said they were happy with their work-life balance in our recent survey.
  • Less stress. Instructional design is a less demanding role than teaching as you don’t have the same safety considerations or unreasonable expectations as you have in many teaching jobs.

From DSC:
I hesitate to post this, as I don’t want to discourage teachers already dealing with all kinds of challenges. But I’m posting it for the teachers who are tired of fighting a broken one-size-fits-all system that answers to their state’s legislators (vs. their students/families/communities). For those teachers hanging in there, please fight for change where you think it’s needed.  We trust your judgment, as you are on the front lines. And I always try to support people working on the front lines — whether in business or in schools.

 

Say Goodbye to Antiquated Performance Reviews — from td.org by Magdalena Nowicka Mook

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Most leaders understand the value of investing in an onboarding process for orientation, productivity, and retention, but few associate onboarding with strong performance over the employee’s full tenure with the organization. By contrast, everboarding is a newer approach that prioritizes ongoing learning and development rather than only an initial commitment. Insights from Deloitte indicate organizations that establish an ongoing learning culture are 52 percent more productive with engagement and achieve retention rates 30–50 percent higher than those that don’t.

When implemented effectively, everboarding embraces proven elements of a coaching culture that establish an ongoing commitment to skill development, deepens understanding of the organization, and supports real-time feedback to prevent stagnancy in high-potential employees brought in through strong hiring practices.

 

The New Academic Arms Race | Competition over amenities is over. The next battleground is technology. — from chronicle.com by Jeffrey J. Selingo

Now, after the pandemic, with the value of the bachelor’s degree foremost in the minds of students and families, a new academic arms race is emerging. This one is centered around academic innovation. The winners will be those institutions that in the decade ahead better apply technology in teaching and learning and develop different approaches to credentialing.

Sure, technology is often seen as plumbing on campuses — as long as it works, we don’t worry about it. And rarely do prospective students on a tour ever ask about academic innovations like extended reality or microcredentials. Campus tours prefer to show off the bells and whistles of residential life within dorms and dining halls.

That’s too bad.

The problem is not a lack of learners, but rather a lack of alignment in what colleges offer to a generation of learners surrounded by Amazon, Netflix, and Instagram, where they can stream entertainment and music anytime, anywhere.

From DSC:
When I worked for Calvin (then College, now University) from 2007-2017, that’s exactly how technologies and the entire IT Department were viewed — as infrastructure providers. We were not viewed as being able to enhance the core business/offerings of the institution. We weren’t relevant in that area. In fact, the IT Department was shoved down in the basement of the library. Our Teaching & Learning Digital Studio was sidelined in a part of the library where few students went to. The Digitial Studio’s marketing efforts didn’t help much, as faculty members didn’t offer assignments that called for multimedia-based deliverables. It was a very tough and steep hill to climb.

Also the Presidents and Provosts over the last couple of decades (not currently though) didn’t think much of online-based learning, and the top administrators dissed the Internet’s ability to provide 24/7 worldwide conversations and learning. They missed the biggest thing to come along in education in 500 years (since the invention of the printing press). Our Teaching & Learning Group provided leadership by starting a Calvin Online pilot. We had 13-14 courses built and inquiries from Christian-based high schools were coming in for dual enrollment scenarios, but when it came time for the College to make a decision, it never happened. The topic/vote never made it to the floor of the Faculty Senate. The faculty and administration missed an enormous opportunity.

When Calvin College became Calvin University in 2019, they were forced to offer online-based classes. Had they supported our T&L Group’s efforts back in the early to mid-2010’s, they would have dove-tailed very nicely into offering more courses to working adults. They would have built up the internal expertise to offer these courses/programs. But the culture of the college put a stop to online-based learning at that time. They now regret that decision I’m sure (as they’ve had to outsource many things and they now offer numerous online-based courses and even entire programs — at a high cost most likely).

My how times have changed.


For another item re: higher education at the 30,000-foot level, see:


Lifelong Learning Models for a Changing Higher Ed Marketplace — from changinghighered.com by Dr. Drumm McNaughton and Amrit Ahluwalia
Exploring the transformation of higher education into lifelong learning hubs for workforce development, with innovative models and continuing education’s role.

Higher education is undergoing transformational change to redefine its role as a facilitator of lifelong learning and workforce development. In this 200th episode of Changing Higher Ed, host Dr. Drumm McNaughton and guest Amrit Ahluwalia, incoming Executive Director for Continuing Studies at Western University, explore innovative models positioning universities as sustainable hubs for socioeconomic mobility.

The Consumer-Driven Educational Landscape
Over 60% of today’s jobs will be redefined by 2025, driving demand for continuous upskilling and reskilling to meet evolving workforce needs. However, higher education’s traditional model of imparting specific knowledge through multi-year degrees is hugely misaligned with this reality.

Soaring education costs have fueled a consumer mindset shift, with learners demanding a clear return on investment directly aligned with their career goals. The expectation is to see immediate skills application and professional impact from their educational investments, not just long-term outcomes years after completion.


 

How Generative AI Owns Higher Education. Now What? — from forbes.co by Steve Andriole

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

What about course videos? Professors can create them (by lecturing into a camera for several hours hopefully in different clothes) from the readings, from their interpretations of the readings, from their own case experiences – from anything they like. But now professors can direct the creation of the videos by talking – actually describing – to a CustomGPTabout what they’d like the video to communicate with their or another image. Wait. What? They can make a video by talking to a CustomGPT and even select the image they want the “actor” to use? Yes. They can also add a British accent and insert some (GenAI-developed) jokes into the videos if they like. All this and much more is now possible. This means that a professor can specify how long the video should be, what sources should be consulted and describe the demeanor the professor wants the video to project.

From DSC:
Though I wasn’t crazy about the clickbait type of title here, I still thought that the article was solid and thought-provoking. It contained several good ideas for using AI.


Excerpt from a recent EdSurge Higher Ed newsletter:


There are darker metaphors though — ones that focus on the hazards for humanity of the tech. Some professors worry that AI bots are simply replacing hired essay-writers for many students, doing work for a student that they can then pass off as their own (and doing it for free).

From DSC:
Hmmm…the use of essay writers was around long before AI became mainstream within higher education. So we already had a serious problem where students didn’t see the why in what they were being asked to do. Some students still aren’t sold on the why of the work in the first place. The situation seems to involve ethics, yes, but it also seems to say that we haven’t sold students on the benefits of putting in the work. Students seem to be saying I don’t care about this stuff…I just need the degree so I can exit stage left.

My main point: The issue didn’t start with AI…it started long before that.

And somewhat relevant here, also see:

I Have Bigger Fish to Fry: Why K12 Education is Not Thinking About AI — from medium.com by Maurie Beasley, M.Ed. (Edited by Jim Beasley)

This financial stagnation is occurring as we face a multitude of escalating challenges. These challenges include but are in no way limited to, chronic absenteeism, widespread student mental health issues, critical staff shortages, rampant classroom behavior issues, a palpable sense of apathy for education in students, and even, I dare say, hatred towards education among parents and policymakers.

Our current focus is on keeping our heads above water, ensuring our students’ safety and mental well-being, and simply keeping our schools staffed and our doors open.


Meet Ed: Ed is an educational friend designed to help students reach their limitless potential. — from lausd.org (Los Angeles School District, the second largest in the U.S.)

What is Ed?
An easy-to-understand learning platform designed by Los Angeles Unified to increase student achievement. It offers personalized guidance and resources to students and families 24/7 in over 100 languages.

Ed is an easy-to-understand learning platform designed by Los Angeles Unified to increase student achievement.

Also relevant/see:

  • Los Angeles Unified Bets Big on ‘Ed,’ an AI Tool for Students — from by Lauraine Langreo
    The Los Angeles Unified School District has launched an AI-powered learning tool that will serve as a “personal assistant” to students and their parents.The tool, named “Ed,” can provide students from the nation’s second-largest district information about their grades, attendance, upcoming tests, and suggested resources to help them improve their academic skills on their own time, Superintendent Alberto Carvalho announced March 20. Students can also use the app to find social-emotional-learning resources, see what’s for lunch, and determine when their bus will arrive.

Could OpenAI’s Sora be a big deal for elementary school kids? — from futureofbeinghuman.com by Andrew Maynard
Despite all the challenges it comes with, AI-generated video could unleash the creativity of young children and provide insights into their inner worlds – if it’s developed and used responsibly

Like many others, I’m concerned about the challenges that come with hyper-realistic AI-generated video. From deep fakes and disinformation to blurring the lines between fact and fiction, generative AI video is calling into question what we can trust, and what we cannot.

And yet despite all the issues the technology is raising, it also holds quite incredible potential, including as a learning and development tool — as long as we develop and use it responsibly.

I was reminded of this a few days back while watching the latest videos from OpenAI created by their AI video engine Sora — including the one below generated from the prompt “an elephant made of leaves running in the jungle”

What struck me while watching this — perhaps more than any of the other videos OpenAI has been posting on its TikTok channel — is the potential Sora has for translating the incredibly creative but often hard to articulate ideas someone may have in their head, into something others can experience.


Can AI Aid the Early Education Workforce? — from edsurge.com by Emily Tate Sullivan
During a panel at SXSW EDU 2024, early education leaders discussed the potential of AI to support and empower the adults who help our nation’s youngest children.

While the vast majority of the conversations about AI in education have centered on K-12 and higher education, few have considered the potential of this innovation in early care and education settings.

At the conference, a panel of early education leaders gathered to do just that, in a session exploring the potential of AI to support and empower the adults who help our nation’s youngest children, titled, “ChatECE: How AI Could Aid the Early Educator Workforce.”

Hau shared that K-12 educators are using the technology to improve efficiency in a number of ways, including to draft individualized education programs (IEPs), create templates for communicating with parents and administrators, and in some cases, to support building lesson plans.


From EIEIO…Seasons Of Change

Again, we’ve never seen change happen as fast as it’s happening.


Enhancing World Language Instruction With AI Image Generators — from eduoptia.org by Rachel Paparone
By crafting an AI prompt in the target language to create an image, students can get immediate feedback on their communication skills.

Educators are, perhaps rightfully so, cautious about incorporating AI in their classrooms. With thoughtful implementation, however, AI image generators, with their ability to use any language, can provide powerful ways for students to engage with the target language and increase their proficiency.


AI in the Classroom: A Teacher’s Toolkit for Transformation — from esheninger.blogspot.com by Eric Sheninger

While AI offers numerous benefits, it’s crucial to remember that it is a tool to empower educators, not replace them. The human connection between teacher and student remains central to fostering creativity, critical thinking, and social-emotional development. The role of teachers will shift towards becoming facilitators, curators, and mentors who guide students through personalized learning journeys. By harnessing the power of AI, educators can create dynamic and effective classrooms that cater to each student’s individual needs. This paves the way for a more engaging and enriching learning experience that empowers students to thrive.


Teachers Are Using AI to Create New Worlds, Help Students with Homework, and Teach English — from themarkup.org by Ross Teixeira; via Matthew Tower
Around the world, these seven teachers are making AI work for them and their students

In this article, seven teachers across the world share their insights on AI tools for educators. You will hear a host of varied opinions and perspectives on everything from whether AI could hasten the decline of learning foreign languages to whether AI-generated lesson plans are an infringement on teachers’ rights. A common theme emerged from those we spoke with: just as the internet changed education, AI tools are here to stay, and it is prudent for teachers to adapt.


Teachers Desperately Need AI Training. How Many Are Getting It? — from edweek.org by Lauraine Langreo

Even though it’s been more than a year since ChatGPT made a big splash in the K-12 world, many teachers say they are still not receiving any training on using artificial intelligence tools in the classroom.

More than 7 in 10 teachers said they haven’t received any professional development on using AI in the classroom, according to a nationally representative EdWeek Research Center survey of 953 educators, including 553 teachers, conducted between Jan. 31 and March 4.

From DSC:
This article mentioned the following resource:

Artificial Intelligence Explorations for Educators — from iste.org


 


How Early Adopters of Gen AI Are Gaining Efficiencies — from knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu by Prasanna (Sonny) Tambe and Scott A. Snyder; via Ray Schroeder on LinkedIn
Enterprises are seeing gains from generative AI in productivity and strategic planning, according to speakers at a recent Wharton conference.

Its unique strengths in translation, summation, and content generation are especially useful in processing unstructured data. Some 80% of all new data in enterprises is unstructured, he noted, citing research firm Gartner. Very little of that unstructured data that resides in places like emails “is used effectively at the point of decision making,” he noted. “[With gen AI], we have a real opportunity” to garner new insights from all the information that resides in emails, team communication platforms like Slack, and agile project management tools like Jira, he said.


6 YouTube Channels to Stay Up to Date with AI — from heaigirl.substack.com by Diana Dovgopol
Here are some cool AI YouTube channels.

Here are 6 YouTube channels I watch to stay up to date with AI. This list will be useful whether you’re a casual AI enthusiast or an experienced programmer.

1. Matt Wolfe: AI for non-coders
This is a fast-growing YouTube channel focused on artificial intelligence for non-coders. On this channel, you’ll find videos about ChatGPT, Midjourney, and any AI tool that it’s gaining popularity.


Top AI mobile apps, Stable Video 3D, & my AI film workflow — from by Heather Cooper
Plus 1-Click 3D animation and other cool AI tools

#3 Photomath
Photomath is a comprehensive math help app that provides step-by-step explanations for a wide range of math problems, from elementary to college level. Photomath is only available as a mobile app. (link)

Features:

  • Get step-by-step solutions with multiple methods to choose from
  • Scan any math problem, including word problems, using the app’s camera
  • Access custom visual aids and extra “how” and “why” tips for deeper understanding

Google researchers unveil ‘VLOGGER’, an AI that can bring still photos to life — from venturebeat.com by Michael Nuñez

Google researchers have developed a new artificial intelligence system that can generate lifelike videos of people speaking, gesturing and moving — from just a single still photo. The technology, called VLOGGER, relies on advanced machine learning models to synthesize startlingly realistic footage, opening up a range of potential applications while also raising concerns around deepfakes and misinformation.



What We Risk By Automating Tasks We Loathe — from marcwatkins.substack.com by Marc Watkins

I’m fascinated by the potential of these tools to augment and enhance our work and creativity. There’s no denying the impressive capabilities we’re already seeing with text generation, image creation, coding assistance, and more. Used thoughtfully, AI can be a powerful productivity multiplier.

At the same time, I have significant concerns about the broader implications of this accelerating technology, especially for education and society at large. We’re traversing new ground at a breakneck pace, and it’s crucial that we don’t blindly embrace AI without considering the potential risks.

My worry is that by automating away too many tasks, even seemingly rote ones like creating slide decks, we risk losing something vital—humanity at the heart of knowledge work.


Nvidia Introduce AI Nurses — from wireprompt.substack.com | Weekkly AI Report from WirePrompt

Nvidia has announced a partnership with Hippocratic AI to introduce AI “agents” aimed at replacing nurses in hospitals. These AI “nurses” come at a significantly low cost compared to human nurses and are purportedly intended to address staffing issues by handling “low-risk,” patient-facing tasks via video calls. However, concerns are raised regarding the ethical implications and effectiveness of replacing human nurses with AI, particularly given the complex nature of medical care.



16 Changes to the Way Enterprises Are Building and Buying Generative AI — from a16z.com by Sarah Wang and Shangda Xu

TABLE OF CONTENTS

  • Resourcing: budgets are growing dramatically and here to stay
  • Models: enterprises are trending toward a multi-model, open source world
  • Use cases: more migrating to production
  • Size of total opportunity: massive and growing quickly

 

Learning Designers Call for More User Testing of Edtech Products and Teaching Materials — from edsurge.com by Jeffrey R. Young
‘Co-creating’ materials with students can lead to better outcomes, experts argue.

He notes that there aren’t good incentives for edtech companies to spend the time and effort on more-detailed testing with students. “They’re selling to the government, to the administration, to the district,” he points out. “They’re not selling to the child — the child has no purchasing power. The kids never really get heard and the teachers rarely get heard. Then they throw it into the classroom and then you’re testing, ‘Did the scores go up?’”

Experts have also called for more teachers and educators to be involved with the development of edtech products.

 

The $340 Billion Corporate Learning Industry Is Poised For Disruption — from joshbersin.com by Josh Bersin

What if, for example, the corporate learning system knew who you were and you could simply ask it a question and it would generate an answer, a series of resources, and a dynamic set of learning objects for you to consume? In some cases you’ll take the answer and run. In other cases you’ll pour through the content. And in other cases you’ll browse through the course and take the time to learn what you need.

And suppose all this happened in a totally personalized way. So you didn’t see a “standard course” but a special course based on your level of existing knowledge?

This is what AI is going to bring us. And yes, it’s already happening today.

 

How to Make the Dream of Education Equity (or Most of It) a Reality — from nataliewexler.substack.com by Natalie Wexler
Studies on the effects of tutoring–by humans or computers–point to ways to improve regular classroom instruction.

One problem, of course, is that it’s prohibitively expensive to hire a tutor for every average or struggling student, or even one for every two or three of them. This was the two-sigma “problem” that Bloom alluded to in the title of his essay: how can the massive benefits of tutoring possibly be scaled up? Both Khan and Zuckerberg have argued that the answer is to have computers, maybe powered by artificial intelligence, serve as tutors instead of humans.

From DSC:
I’m hoping that AI-backed learning platforms WILL help many people of all ages and backgrounds. But I realize — and appreciate what Natalie is saying here as well — that human beings are needed in the learning process (especially at younger ages). 

But without the human element, that’s unlikely to be enough. Students are more likely to work hard to please a teacher than to please a computer.

Natalie goes on to talk about training all teachers in cognitive science — a solid idea for sure. That’s what I was trying to get at with this graphic:
.

We need to take more of the research from learning science and apply it in our learning spaces.

.
But I’m not as hopeful in all teachers getting trained in cognitive science…as it should have happened (in the Schools of Education and in the K12 learning ecosystem at large) by now. Perhaps it will happen, given enough time.

And with more homeschooling and blended programs of education occurring, that idea gets stretched even further. 

K-12 Hybrid Schooling Is in High Demand — from realcleareducation.com by Keri D. Ingraham (emphasis below from DSC); via GSV

Parents are looking for a different kind of education for their children. A 2024 poll of parents reveals that 72% are considering, 63% are searching for, and 44% have selected a new K-12 school option for their children over the past few years. So, what type of education are they seeking?

Additional polling data reveals that 49% of parents would prefer their child learn from home at least one day a week. While 10% want full-time homeschooling, the remaining 39% of parents desire their child to learn at home one to four days a week, with the remaining days attending school on-campus. Another parent poll released this month indicates that an astonishing 64% of parents indicated that if they were looking for a new school for their child, they would enroll him or her in a hybrid school.

 

Which AI should I use? Superpowers and the State of Play — from by Ethan Mollick
And then there were three

For over a year, GPT-4 was the dominant AI model, clearly much smarter than any of the other LLM systems available. That situation has changed in the last month, there are now three GPT-4 class models, all powering their own chatbots: GPT-4 (accessible through ChatGPT Plus or Microsoft’s CoPilot), Anthropic’s Claude 3 Opus, and Google’s Gemini Advanced1.

Where we stand
We are in a brief period in the AI era where there are now multiple leading models, but none has yet definitively beaten the GPT-4 benchmark set over a year ago. While this may represent a plateau in AI abilities, I believe this is likely to change in the coming months as, at some point, models like GPT-5 and Gemini 2.0 will be released. In the meantime, you should be using a GPT-4 class model and using it often enough to learn what it does well. You can’t go wrong with any of them, pick a favorite and use it…

From DSC:
Here’s a powerful quote from Ethan:

In fact, in my new book I postulate that you haven’t really experienced AI until you have had three sleepless nights of existential anxiety, after which you can start to be productive again.


Using AI for Immersive Educational Experiences — from automatedteach.com by Graham Clay
Realistic video brings course content to life but requires AI literacy.

For us, I think the biggest promise of AI tools like Sora — that can create video with ease — is that they lower the cost of immersive educational experiences. This increases the availability of these experiences, expanding their reach to student populations who wouldn’t otherwise have them, whether due to time, distance, or expense.

Consider the profound impact on a history class, where students are transported to California during the gold rush through hyperrealistic video sequences. This vivifies the historical content and cultivates a deeper connection with the material.

In fact, OpenAI has already demonstrated the promise of this sort of use case, with a very simple prompt producing impressive results…


The Empathy Illusion: How AI Agents Could Manipulate Students — from marcwatkins.substack.com by Marc Watkins

Take this scenario. A student misses a class and, within twenty minutes, receives a series of texts and even a voicemail from a very concerned and empathic-sounding voice wanting to know what’s going on. Of course, the text is entirely generated, and the voice is synthetic as well, but the student likely doesn’t know this. To them, communication isn’t something as easy to miss or brush off as an email. It sounds like someone who cares is talking to them.

But let’s say that isn’t enough. By that evening, the student still hadn’t logged into their email or checked the LMS. The AI’s strategic reasoning is communicating with the predictive AI and analyzing the pattern of behavior against students who succeed or fail vs. students who are ill. The AI tracks the student’s movements on campus, monitors their social media usage, and deduces the student isn’t ill and is blowing off class.

The AI agent resumes communication with the student. But this time, the strategic AI adopts a different persona, not the kind and empathetic persona used for the initial contact, but a stern, matter-of-fact one. The student’s phone buzzes with alerts that talk about scholarships being lost, teachers being notified, etc. The AI anticipates the excuses the student will use and presents evidence tracking the student’s behavior to show they are not sick.


Not so much focused on learning ecosystems, but still worth mentioning:

The top 100 Gen AI Consumer Apps — from a16z.com / andreessen horowitz by Olivia Moore


 

 

The Edtech Insiders Rundown of SXSW EDU 2024 — from edtechinsiders.substack.com by Ben Kornell, Alex Sarlin, and Sarah Morin
And more on our ASU + GSV Happy Hour, GenAI in edtech market valuations, and interviews from The Common Sense Summit.

Theme 1: The Kids Are Not Alright
This year’s SXSW EDU had something for everyone, with over a dozen “Program Tracks.” However, the one theme that truly connected the entire conference was mental health.

36 sessions were specifically tagged with mental health and wellness, but in sessions on topics ranging from literacy to edtech to civic engagement, presenters continued to come back again and again to the mental health crisis amongst teens and young adults.

Theme 2: Aye AI, Captain
Consistent with past conferences, this year leaned in on the K12 education world. As expected, one of the hottest topics for K12 was the role of AI (or lack thereof) in schools. Key takeaways included…


AI Literacy: A New Graduation Requirement and Civic Imperative — from gettingsmart.com by Tom Vander Ark and Mason Pashia

Key Points

  • There is still time to ensure that all of your students graduate with an understanding of how AI works, why it is important and how to best use it.

What would it look like to make a commitment that come graduation every senior will have at least basic AI literacy? This includes an appreciation of AI as a creation engine and learning partner but also an understanding of the risks of deepfakes and biased curation. We’re entering a time where to quote Ethan Mollick “You can’t trust anything you read or see ever again.” Whether formal or informal, it’s time to start building AI literacy.


New Alabama Education Law Represents Small But Significant Advance — from forbes.com by Jeanne Allen

Valiant Cross Academy raises the bar for young men. A young man seated in a pew is raising his hand.

More than 50 years later, across the street from the church and concerned with declining education and the pace of social change, brothers Anthony and Fred Brock founded Valiant Cross Academy, an all-male academy aimed at “helping boys of color become men of valor.”

Valiant Cross embodies King’s hopes, pursuing the dream that its students will be judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin, and working to ensure that they are well prepared for productive lives filled with accomplishment and purpose.

“We’re out to prove that it’s an opportunity gap, not an achievement gap” says head of school Anthony Brock. And they have. In 2022, 100 percent of Valiant seniors graduated from the academy, pursuing post-graduate options, enrolling in either four- or two-year college, or established career-training programs.


 

 

GTC March 2024 Keynote with NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang


Also relevant/see:




 

Conditions that trigger behaviour change — from peoplealchemy.com by Paul Matthews; via Learning Now TV

“Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Learning Transfer’s ultimate outcome is behaviour change, so we must understand the conditions that trigger a behaviour to start.

According to Fogg, three specific elements must converge at the same moment for a specific behaviour to occur. Given that learning transfer is only successful when the learner starts behaving in the desired new ways, Fogg’s work is critical to understanding how to generate these new behaviours. The Fogg Behavioural Model [*1] states that B=MAP. That is, a specific behaviour will occur if at the same moment there is sufficient motivation, sufficient ability and sufficient prompt. If the behaviour does not occur, at least one of these three elements is missing or below the threshold required.

The prompt is, in effect, a call to action to do a specific behaviour. The prompt must be ‘loud’ enough for the target person to perceive it and be consciously aware of it. Once aware of a prompt, the target immediately, and largely unconsciously, assesses their ability to carry out the requested behaviour: how difficult would this be, how long will it take, who can help me, and so on. They base this on their perception of the difficulty of the requested behaviour, and their ability, as they see it, to achieve that behaviour.

 


[Report] Generative AI Top 150: The World’s Most Used AI Tools (Feb 2024) — from flexos.work by Daan van Rossum
FlexOS.work surveyed Generative AI platforms to reveal which get used most. While ChatGPT reigns supreme, countless AI platforms are used by millions.

As the FlexOS research study “Generative AI at Work” concluded based on a survey amongst knowledge workers, ChatGPT reigns supreme.

2. AI Tool Usage is Way Higher Than People Expect – Beating Netflix, Pinterest, Twitch.
As measured by data analysis platform Similarweb based on global web traffic tracking, the AI tools in this list generate over 3 billion monthly visits.

With 1.67 billion visits, ChatGPT represents over half of this traffic and is already bigger than Netflix, Microsoft, Pinterest, Twitch, and The New York Times.

.


Artificial Intelligence Act: MEPs adopt landmark law — from europarl.europa.eu

  • Safeguards on general purpose artificial intelligence
  • Limits on the use of biometric identification systems by law enforcement
  • Bans on social scoring and AI used to manipulate or exploit user vulnerabilities
  • Right of consumers to launch complaints and receive meaningful explanations


The untargeted scraping of facial images from CCTV footage to create facial recognition databases will be banned © Alexander / Adobe Stock


A New Surge in Power Use Is Threatening U.S. Climate Goals — from nytimes.com by Brad Plumer and Nadja Popovich
A boom in data centers and factories is straining electric grids and propping up fossil fuels.

Something unusual is happening in America. Demand for electricity, which has stayed largely flat for two decades, has begun to surge.

Over the past year, electric utilities have nearly doubled their forecasts of how much additional power they’ll need by 2028 as they confront an unexpected explosion in the number of data centers, an abrupt resurgence in manufacturing driven by new federal laws, and millions of electric vehicles being plugged in.


OpenAI and the Fierce AI Industry Debate Over Open Source — from bloomberg.com by Rachel Metz

The tumult could seem like a distraction from the startup’s seemingly unending march toward AI advancement. But the tension, and the latest debate with Musk, illuminates a central question for OpenAI, along with the tech world at large as it’s increasingly consumed by artificial intelligence: Just how open should an AI company be?

The meaning of the word “open” in “OpenAI” seems to be a particular sticking point for both sides — something that you might think sounds, on the surface, pretty clear. But actual definitions are both complex and controversial.


Researchers develop AI-driven tool for near real-time cancer surveillance — from medicalxpress.com by Mark Alewine; via The Rundown AI
Artificial intelligence has delivered a major win for pathologists and researchers in the fight for improved cancer treatments and diagnoses.

In partnership with the National Cancer Institute, or NCI, researchers from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Louisiana State University developed a long-sequenced AI transformer capable of processing millions of pathology reports to provide experts researching cancer diagnoses and management with exponentially more accurate information on cancer reporting.


 

Doubts About Value Are Deterring College Enrollment — from insidehighered.com by Jessica Blake
Survey data suggests that prospective learners are being dissuaded from college by skepticism about whether degrees are worth the time and money.

Enrollment has been declining in higher education for more than a decade, and the most common explanations in recent years have been lingering effects of the pandemic and a looming demographic cliff expected to shrink the number of traditional-age college students. But new research suggests that public doubts about the value of a college degree are a key contributor.

The study—conducted by Edge Research, a marketing research firm, and HCM Strategists, a public policy and advocacy consulting firm with funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation—uses focus groups and parallel national surveys of current high school students and of adults who decided to leave college or who didn’t go at all to link the value proposition of a college degree and Americans’ behaviors after high school.

“At the end of the day, higher education has a lot of work to do to convince these audiences of its value,” said Terrell Dunn, an HCM consultant.


‘A Condemnation’: Under Mental Health Strains, Students Weigh Quitting College — from edsurge.com by Daniel Mollenkamp

When college students think about quitting, it’s most likely because of mental health strain or stress.

That’s according to the recent data from the “State of Higher Education Study,” conducted by the analytics company Gallup and the private foundation Lumina.

 

Edtech Unicorns Are Evolving Rather Than Disrupting — from bloomberg.com by Alex Webb

Consider Coursera Inc., the most prominent survivor of that early edtech hype. It’s now a public company, with a hefty $2.3 billion valuation. Finally, 12 years after it was founded — by, incidentally, another Google veteran in Andrew Ng — it’s set to report its first profit this year, according to analyst estimates. And the enterprise business is considerably more profitable, enjoying a 68% gross margin in 2023, compared to the consumer business’s 53% margin.

Figuring out the right match between training and utility is how several business schools seem to have developed successful online courses — which they are charging top dollar for. They’re in close contact with the sort of large corporations who hire their graduates, giving them a more intimate understanding of what those businesses seek.

Harvard Business School is one example. It made $74 million from online courses in fiscal 2022, the most recent year for which data is available

 
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