Education evolves to match the speed of tech innovation — from Tech predictions for 2024 and beyond — from allthingsdistributed.com
Higher education alone cannot keep up with the rate of technological change. Industry-led skills-based training programs will emerge that more closely resemble the journeys of skilled tradespeople. This shift to continuous learning will benefit individuals and businesses alike.

Similar to the software development processes of decades past, we have reached a pivotal point with tech education, and we will see what was once bespoke on-the-job-training for a few evolve into industry-led skills-based education for many.

We have seen glimpses of this shift underway for years. Companies like Coursera, who originally focused on consumers, have partnered with enterprises to scale their upskilling and reskilling efforts. Degree apprenticeships have continued to grow in popularity because education can be specialized by the employer, and apprentices can earn as they learn. But now, companies themselves are starting to seriously invest in skills-based education at scale.

All of these programs enable learners at different points in their career journey to gain the exact skills they need to enter in-demand roles, without the commitment of a traditional multi-year program.

But there will be many industries where the impact of technology outpaces traditional educational systems. To meet the demands of business, we will see a new era of industry-led educational opportunities that can’t be ignored.

From DSC:
It seems to me that this is saying that higher education is not able to — nor will it be able to in the future — match the speed of innovation taking place today. Therefore, alternatives will continue to hit the learning landscapes/radar. For example, Amazon’s CTO, Dr. Werner Vogels, mentioned Amazon’s efforts here:

Amazon just announced that it has already trained 21 million tech learners across the world in tech skills. And it’s in part thanks to programs like the Mechatronics and Robotics Apprenticeship and AWS Cloud Institute.

 

Expanding Bard’s understanding of YouTube videos — via AI Valley

  • What: We’re taking the first steps in Bard’s ability to understand YouTube videos. For example, if you’re looking for videos on how to make olive oil cake, you can now also ask how many eggs the recipe in the first video requires.
  • Why: We’ve heard you want deeper engagement with YouTube videos. So we’re expanding the YouTube Extension to understand some video content so you can have a richer conversation with Bard about it.

Reshaping the tree: rebuilding organizations for AI — from oneusefulthing.org by Ethan Mollick
Technological change brings organizational change.

I am not sure who said it first, but there are only two ways to react to exponential change: too early or too late. Today’s AIs are flawed and limited in many ways. While that restricts what AI can do, the capabilities of AI are increasing exponentially, both in terms of the models themselves and the tools these models can use. It might seem too early to consider changing an organization to accommodate AI, but I think that there is a strong possibility that it will quickly become too late.

From DSC:
Readers of this blog have seen the following graphic for several years now, but there is no question that we are in a time of exponential change. One would have had an increasingly hard time arguing the opposite of this perspective during that time.

 


 



Nvidia’s revenue triples as AI chip boom continues — from cnbc.com by Jordan Novet; via GSV

KEY POINTS

  • Nvidia’s results surpassed analysts’ projections for revenue and income in the fiscal fourth quarter.
  • Demand for Nvidia’s graphics processing units has been exceeding supply, thanks to the rise of generative artificial intelligence.
  • Nvidia announced the GH200 GPU during the quarter.

Here’s how the company did, compared to the consensus among analysts surveyed by LSEG, formerly known as Refinitiv:

  • Earnings: $4.02 per share, adjusted, vs. $3.37 per share expected
  • Revenue: $18.12 billion, vs. $16.18 billion expected

Nvidia’s revenue grew 206% year over year during the quarter ending Oct. 29, according to a statement. Net income, at $9.24 billion, or $3.71 per share, was up from $680 million, or 27 cents per share, in the same quarter a year ago.



 



Don’t Believe the Hype? Practical Thoughts About Using AI in Legal (Stephen Embry – TechLaw Crossroads) — from tlpodcast.com by Stephen Embry

Despite the hype and big promises about AI, if it is used correctly, could it be the differentiator that sets good legal professionals apart from the pack? Stephen Embry offers a good argument for this in the latest episode.

Stephen is a long-time attorney and the legal tech aficionado behind the TechLaw Crossroads blog– a great resource for practical and real-world insight about legal tech and how technology is impacting the practice of law. Embry emphasizes that good lawyers will embrace artificial intelligence to increase efficiency and serve their clients better, leaving more time for strategic thinking and advisory roles.

 

The Beatles’ final song is now streaming thanks to AI — from theverge.com by Chris Welch
Machine learning helped Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr turn an old John Lennon demo into what’s likely the band’s last collaborative effort.


Scientists excited by AI tool that grades severity of rare cancer — from bbc.com by Fergus Walsh

Artificial intelligence is nearly twice as good at grading the aggressiveness of a rare form of cancer from scans as the current method, a study suggests.

By recognising details invisible to the naked eye, AI was 82% accurate, compared with 44% for lab analysis.

Researchers from the Royal Marsden Hospital and Institute of Cancer Research say it could improve treatment and benefit thousands every year.

They are also excited by its potential for spotting other cancers early.


Microsoft unveils ‘LeMa’: A revolutionary AI learning method mirroring human problem solving — from venturebeat.com by Michael Nuñez

Researchers from Microsoft Research Asia, Peking University, and Xi’an Jiaotong University have developed a new technique to improve large language models’ (LLMs) ability to solve math problems by having them learn from their mistakes, akin to how humans learn.

The researchers have revealed a pioneering strategy, Learning from Mistakes (LeMa), which trains AI to correct its own mistakes, leading to enhanced reasoning abilities, according to a research paper published this week.

Also from Michael Nuñez at venturebeat.com, see:


GPTs for all, AzeemBot; conspiracy theorist AI; big tech vs. academia; reviving organs ++448 — from exponentialviewco by Azeem Azhar and Chantal Smith


Personalized A.I. Agents Are Here. Is the World Ready for Them? — from ytimes.com by Kevin Roose (behind a paywall)

You could think of the recent history of A.I. chatbots as having two distinct phases.

The first, which kicked off last year with the release of ChatGPT and continues to this day, consists mainly of chatbots capable of talking about things. Greek mythology, vegan recipes, Python scripts — you name the topic and ChatGPT and its ilk can generate some convincing (if occasionally generic or inaccurate) text about it.

That ability is impressive, and frequently useful, but it is really just a prelude to the second phase: artificial intelligence that can actually do things. Very soon, tech companies tell us, A.I. “agents” will be able to send emails and schedule meetings for us, book restaurant reservations and plane tickets, and handle complex tasks like “negotiate a raise with my boss” or “buy Christmas presents for all my family members.”


From DSC:
Very cool!


Nvidia Stock Jumps After Unveiling of Next Major AI Chip. It’s Bad News for Rivals. — from barrons.com

On Monday, Nvidia (ticker: NVDA) announced its new H200 Tensor Core GPU. The chip incorporates 141 gigabytes of memory and offers up to 60% to 90% performance improvements versus its current H100 model when used for inference, or generating answers from popular AI models.

From DSC:
The exponential curve seems to be continuing — 60% to 90% performance improvements is a huge boost in performance.

Also relevant/see:


The 5 Best GPTs for Work — from the AI Exchange

Custom GPTs are exploding, and we wanted to highlight our top 5 that we’ve seen so far:

 

How Have Schools Improved Since the Pandemic? What Teachers Had to Say — from the74million.org by Cory Beets
Educator’s view: In technology, mental health, and nurturing and solutions-oriented environments, COVID provided lessons schools have taken to heart.

In doing research for my Ph.D. program, I sought out the perspectives of five teachers through informal conversations about how schools have improved since the pandemic. Four themes emerged.

From DSC:
To add another positive to the COVID-19 picture…

Just like COVID-19 did more for the advancement of online learning within our learning ecosystems than 20+ years of online learning development, COVID-19 may have done more to move our younger learners along the flexibility route that will serve them well in their futures. That is, with today’s exponential pace of change, we all need to be more agile and flexible — and be able to reinvent ourselves along the way. The type of learning that our K-12ers went through during COVID-19 may have been the most helpful thing yet for their future success and career development. They will need to pivot, adapt, and take right turn after right turn. 

 

180 Degree Turn: NYC District Goes From Banning ChatGPT to Exploring AI’s Potential — from edweek.org by Alyson Klein (behind paywall)

New York City Public Schools will launch an Artificial Intelligence Policy Lab to guide the nation’s largest school district’s approach to this rapidly evolving technology.


The Leader’s Blindspot: How to Prepare for the Real Future — from preview.mailerlite.io by the AIEducator
The Commonly Held Belief: AI Will Automate Only Boring, Repetitive Tasks First

The Days of Task-Based Views on AI Are Numbered
The winds of change are sweeping across the educational landscape (emphasis DSC):

  1. Multifaceted AI: AI technologies are not one-trick ponies; they are evolving into complex systems that can handle a variety of tasks.
  2. Rising Expectations: As technology becomes integral to our lives, the expectations for personalised, efficient education are soaring.
  3. Skill Transformation: Future job markets will demand a different skill set, one that is symbiotic with AI capabilities.

Teaching: How to help students better understand generative AI — from chronicle.com by Beth McMurtrie
Beth describes ways professors have used ChatGPT to bolster critical thinking in writing-intensive courses

Kevin McCullen, an associate professor of computer science at the State University of New York at Plattsburgh, teaches a freshman seminar about AI and robotics. As part of the course, students read Machines of Loving Grace: The Quest for Common Ground Between Humans and Robots, by John Markoff. McCullen had the students work in groups to outline and summarize the first three chapters. Then he showed them what ChatGPT had produced in an outline.

“Their version and ChatGPT’s version seemed to be from two different books,” McCullen wrote. “ChatGPT’s version was essentially a ‘laundry list’ of events. Their version was narratives of what they found interesting. The students had focused on what the story was telling them, while ChatGPT focused on who did what in what year.” The chatbot also introduced false information, such as wrong chapter names.

The students, he wrote, found the writing “soulless.”


7 Questions with Dr. Cristi Ford, VP of Academic Affairs at D2L — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly

In the Wild West of generative AI, educators and institutions are working out how best to use the technology for learning. How can institutions define AI guidelines that allow for experimentation while providing students with consistent guidance on appropriate use of AI tools?

To find out, we spoke with Dr. Cristi Ford, vice president of academic affairs at D2L. With more than two decades of educational experience in nonprofit, higher education, and K-12 institutions, Ford works with D2L’s institutional partners to elevate best practices in teaching, learning, and student support. Here, she shares her advice on setting and communicating AI policies that are consistent and future-ready.


AI Platform Built by Teachers, for Teachers, Class Companion Raises $4 Million to Tap Into the Power of Practice — from prweb.com

“If we want to use AI to improve education, we need more teachers at the table,” said Avery Pan, Class Companion co-founder and CEO. “Class Companion is designed by teachers, for teachers, to harness the most sophisticated AI and improve their classroom experience. Developing technologies specifically for teachers is imperative to supporting our next generation of students and education system.”


7 Questions on Generative AI in Learning Design — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly
Open LMS Adoption and Education Specialist Michael Vaughn on the challenges and possibilities of using artificial intelligence to move teaching and learning forward.

The potential for artificial intelligence tools to speed up course design could be an attractive prospect for overworked faculty and spread-thin instructional designers. Generative AI can shine, for example, in tasks such as reworking assessment question sets, writing course outlines and learning objectives, and generating subtitles for audio and video clips. The key, says Michael Vaughn, adoption and education specialist at learning platform Open LMS, is treating AI like an intern who can be guided and molded along the way, and whose work is then vetted by a human expert.

We spoke with Vaughn about how best to utilize generative AI in learning design, ethical issues to consider, and how to formulate an institution-wide policy that can guide AI use today and in the future.


10 Ways Technology Leaders Can Step Up and Into the Generative AI Discussion in Higher Ed — from er.educause.edu by Lance Eaton and Stan Waddell

  1. Offer Short Primers on Generative AI
  2. Explain How to Get Started
  3. Suggest Best Practices for Engaging with Generative AI
  4. Give Recommendations for Different Groups
  5. Recommend Tools
  6. Explain the Closed vs. Open-Source Divide
  7. Avoid Pitfalls
  8. Conduct Workshops and Events
  9. Spot the Fake
  10. Provide Proper Guidance on the Limitations of AI Detectors


 

The Enemy Within: Former College Presidents Offer Warnings — from forbes-com.cdn.ampproject.org by David Rosowsky; via Robert Gibson on LinkedIn

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Brian Mitchell, former president of Bucknell University and Washington & Jefferson College, draws on his experience to offer insight in his newest Forbes contribution. He also offers a stern warning: “Boards, administrators, and faculty must wake up to the new realities they now face… the faculty can no longer live in a world that no longer exists… institutional change will happen at a speed to which they are unaccustomed and potentially unwilling to accept.” President Mitchell then goes on to offer some immediate steps that can be taken. Perhaps the most important is to “abandon the approach to governance where trustees are updated in their periodic board meetings.”

Incremental change is possible, but transformational change may not be.

Therein lies the conundrum about which Rosenberg writes in his new book. Higher ed’s own systems are inhibiting needed transformational change.

Also just published was the book, “Whatever It Is, I’m Against It: Resistance to Change in Higher Education” by Brian Rosenberg, former president of Macalester College. Articles on Rosenberg’s observations, analysis, and cautions have appeared this month in both The Chronicle of Higher Education and Inside Higher Ed, the two leading higher education publications in the US.


Addendum on 10/6/23:

Higher Education as Its Own Worst Enemy — from insidehighered.com/ by Susan H. Greenberg
In a wide-ranging discussion about his new book, Brian Rosenberg explains how shared governance, tenure and other practices stifle change on college campuses.

He argues that the institutions designed to foster critical inquiry and the open exchange of ideas are themselves staunchly resistant to both. 

The other would be some serious thinking about pedagogy and how students learn. Because the research is there if people were willing to take it seriously and think about ways of providing an education that is not quite as reliant upon lots of faculty with Ph.D.s. Is that easy to do? No, but it is something that I think there should at least begin to be some serious discussions about.

Shared governance is one of those things that if you ask any college president off the record, they’ll probably express their frustration, then they’ll go back to their campus and wax poetic about the wonders of shared governance, because that’s what they have to do to survive.

 

***
From DSC:
Having come from various other areas of higher education back in 2017, I was *amazed* to see *how far behind* legal education was from the rest of higher ed. And this is directly tied to what the American Bar Association allows (or doesn’t allow). The ABA has done a terrible job of helping Americans deal with today’s pace of change.

 

From DSC: If this is true, how will we meet this type of demand?!?

RESKILLING NEEDED FOR 40% OF WORKFORCE BECAUSE OF AI, REPORT FROM IBM SAYS — from staffingindustry.com; via GSV

Generative AI will require skills upgrades for workers, according to a report from IBM based on a survey of executives from around the world. One finding: Business leaders say 40% of their workforces will need to reskill as AI and automation are implemented over the next three years. That could translate to 1.4 billion people in the global workforce who require upskilling, according to the company.

 

Excerpts from the Too Long Didn’t Read (TLDR) section from AIxEducation Day 1: My Takeaways — from stefanbauschard.substack.com by Stefan Bauschard (emphasis DSC)

* There was a lot of talk about learning bots. This talk included the benefits of 1:1 tutoring, access to education for those who don’t currently have it (developing world), the ability to do things for which we currently don’t have enough teachers and support staff (speech pathology), individualized instruction (it will be good at this soon), and stuff that it is already good at (24/7 availability, language tutoring, immediate feedback regarding argumentation and genre (not facts :), putting students on the right track, comprehensive feedback, more critical feedback).

* Students are united. The student organizers and those who spoke at the conference have concerns about future employment, want to learn to use generative AI, and express concern about being prepared for the “real world.” They also all want a say in how generative AI is used in the college classroom. Many professors spoke about the importance of having conversations with students and involving them in the creation of AI policies as well.

* I think it’s fair to say that all professors who spoke thought students were going to use generative AI regardless of whether or not it was permitted, though some hoped for honesty.

* No professor who spoke thought using a plagiarism detector was a good idea.

* Everyone thought that significant advancements in AI technology were inevitable.

* Almost everyone expressed being overwhelmed by the rate of change.


Stefan recommended the following resource:


 


From DSC:
Which reminds me of some graphics:

The pace has changed -- don't come onto the track in a Model T

 

Education was once the No. 1 major for college students. Now it’s an afterthought. — from cbsnews.com by Aimee Picchi & Sanvi Bangalore; via GSV

Today, education is an afterthought for many college students, who are more likely to study business, engineering, and even the visual and performing arts, according to data from the National Center for Educational Statistics. Even as the population of college students has increased by 150% since 1970, the number of bachelor’s degrees in education has plummeted by almost 50% — a steeper drop than that for English, literature and foreign language majors.


On a somewhat-related note, also see:

‘We’re going to have to be a little more nimble’: How school districts are responding to AI — from by Javeria Salman
School districts are training teachers on generative AI and encouraging them to experiment with the tools for lesson planning and remedial help

Roschelle said he wants to see school leaders and educators experiment in ways that don’t carry big risks for students, such as changing a few lesson plans. “I personally would advise school districts not to rush into buying a particular product, but really treat this year as a chance to educate yourself,” he said.

It’s a sentiment echoed by Richard Culatta, CEO of ISTE, which recently published a guide on AI in collaboration with AASA, the School Superintendents Association. What schools need to do, he said, is provide teachers with a better understanding of what AI is and share examples of how to use it.

 

National ChatGPT Survey: Teachers Accepting AI Into Classrooms & Workflow — Even More Than Students — from the74million.org by Greg Toppo
42% of students use ChatGPT, up from 33% in a prior survey. Their teachers are way ahead of them, with now 63% saying they’ve used the tool on the job

Teachers … and parents … believe it’s legit
Teachers who use ChatGPT overwhelmingly give it good reviews. Fully 84% say it has positively impacted their classes, with about 6 in 10 (61%) predicting it will have “legitimate educational uses that we cannot ignore.”

New Book Aims to Reshape the Future of Learning (With Your Help) — from samchaltain.substack.com by Sam Chaltain

  • What circumstances would be required for the existing educational model to be deemed obsolete?
  • What stands in the way of those circumstances coming to pass?
  • And if you were to craft a tool that actually helped people create those circumstances, what would you want that sort of resource to be, say, and do?

Last week, in Istanbul, a select group of educators, architects, students and entrepreneurs met to wrestle with those questions, as part of a yearlong collaborative design project.

What small changes could have the biggest impact and help spark the larger revolution we seek?

Will the future even have occupations — and if so, what are they most likely to be? 

What is most essential to know and embody in the next 25 years?

The Great Unbundling — from educationnext.org by Joseph Olchefske and Steven Adamowski
Is the parents’ rights movement opening a new frontier in school choice?

The mindsets of parents are changing—rapidly—as they make decisions about the schooling of their children. Over the past few years, a convergence of two megatrends—pandemic desperation and parental-rights politics—has driven many families to reconsider the traditional school model and find ways of “unbundling” their children’s schooling into discrete elements that are controlled by the parent rather than the school.

While parent-led unbundling is not a new phenomenon, the current movement has expanded so quickly that it’s been dubbed “the Great Unbundling” of K–12 schooling.

The Great Unbundling is now influencing the education marketplace, as a broad set of nonschool vendors have responded to this unprecedented demand by pitching their education services directly to families: “microschools,” online courses, private tutoring, learning pods, and outdoor learning experiences.

Yes, AI could profoundly disrupt education. But maybe that’s not a bad thing — from theguardian.com by Rose Luckin; with thanks to Will Richardson and Homa Tavangar for this resource
Humans need to excel at things AI can’t do – and that means more creativity and critical thinking and less memorisation

Staying ahead of AI will mean radically rethinking what education is for, and what success means. Human intelligence is far more impressive than any AI system we see today. We possess a rich and diverse intelligence, much of which is unrecognised by our current education system.

How we can teach children so they survive AI – and cope with whatever comes next — from theguardian.com by George Monbiot
It’s not enough to build learning around a single societal shift. Students should be trained to handle a rapidly changing world

I don’t claim to have definitive answers. But I believe certain principles would help. One is that rigidity is lethal. Any aspect of an education system that locks pupils in to fixed patterns of thought and action will enhance their vulnerability to rapid and massive change. For instance, there could be no worse preparation for life than England’s Standard Assessment Tests, which dominate year 6 teaching. If the testimony of other parents I know is representative, SATs are a crushing experience for the majority of pupils, snuffing out enthusiasm, forcing them down a narrow, fenced track and demanding rigidity just as their minds are seeking to blossom and expand.

Education, to the greatest extent possible, should be joyful and delightful, not only because joy and delight are essential to our wellbeing, but also because we are more likely to withstand major change if we see acquiring new knowledge and skills as a fascinating challenge, not a louring threat.

BRINGING AI TO SCHOOL: TIPS FOR SCHOOL LEADERS— a mini ebook from ISTE

Artificial Intelligence is having a major impact on education. Whether you are excited or
concerned about AI, as a school leader you have a responsibility to ensure AI is approached
thoughtfully and appropriately in your school community and informs your vision for teaching and learning. This guide will help you quickly gain the background you need as a learning leader in an AI infused world.

Schools that have been successful in bringing AI into their schools in purposeful ways have some common strategies. The following five strategies are critical for a successful AI culture in your school.

The Potential Impact of AI Technology on Education. — from medium.com by Happiness Uduak

In this article, we’ll explore the potential impact of AI on education, and then take a look at how it could shape the human view of learning for good.

Teaching Through Asking Rather Than Telling — from edutopia by Jay Schauer
High school teachers can promote active learning by strategically replacing some direct instruction with questions that produce thoughtful conversations.

Does much of your teaching resemble the lectures you and 20 or 50 or 400 of your closest college friends received from a “sage on the stage”? Are you frustrated that most of your students won’t remember much from the fascinating information you just delivered to them for 15 or 30 or 55 minutes? If so, maybe it’s time to implement more ARTT—Ask, Rather Than Tell—into your teaching.

I started doing a lot of asking in order to help students make connections, establish common baseline understandings, and identify knowledge gaps or areas of misunderstanding, rather than telling them information. My lectures then evolved into more meaningful conversations.

Best Free Virtual Labs — from techlearning.com by Diana Restifo
These best virtual lab sites and apps are all free, highly engaging, and informative—and most don’t require registration

Many schools don’t have robust in-person laboratory facilities, instead relying primarily on dry textbooks to teach difficult STEM topics. But even schools with quality labs can benefit from these innovative and flexible online simulations.

The following top virtual lab sites and apps are all free, highly engaging, and informative—and most don’t require registration. Since most browsers no longer support Java or Flash, sites built exclusively with those outdated technologies have been excluded.

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer launching new education-focused state department — from detroitnews.com by Craig Mauger and Chad Livengood

Whitmer’s office said Wednesday the new Michigan Department of Lifelong Education, Achievement and Potential, or MiLEAP, will feature offices governing early childhood education, higher education and “education partnerships.”

“Establishing MiLEAP ensures all available resources, data and dollars are aligned around a single vision — supporting an education system focused on lifelong learning that can support the economy of the future and helping anyone make it in Michigan,” according to a “talking points” document obtained by The Detroit News on Wednesday morning.

How to Get Kids to Read for Fun — from nataliewexler.substack.com by Natalie Wexler
An overemphasis on analytical skills can make reading a joyless task.

Schools have been giving students isolated bits of text rather than letting them sink their teeth into engaging novels, and they’ve prioritized teaching analytical reading skills over allowing kids to immerse themselves in a good story.

Celebrating Student Interests to Create a Positive High School Culture — from edutopia.org by Nicole Rossi-Mumpower
Events that center students’ picks in art, music, and food can create powerful opportunities for them to increase their sense of belonging.

Modeled after the First Friday events that take place in many cities and towns (when community members gather to experience local culture), First Fridays at school offer students a chance to listen to music, view art, and sample cuisine.?The tradition has become a cornerstone of our school community and is replicable across school sites.

THE IMPORTANCE OF A MEANINGFUL SCHOOL CULTURE
Creating a positive school climate and culture is essential for student success. When students feel like they are an important part of the community, they’re more likely to be engaged in their learning and have a positive attitude toward school.

 

Accenture announces jaw-dropping $3 billion investment in AI — from venturebeat.com by Carl Franzen; via Superhuman

Excerpt:

The generative AI announcements are coming fast and furious these days, but among the biggest in terms of sheer dollar commitments just landed: Accenture, the global professional services and consulting giant, today announced it will invest $3 billion (with a “b”!) in AI over the next three years in building out its team of AI professionals and AI-focused solutions for its clients.

“There is unprecedented interest in all areas of AI, and the substantial investment we are making in our Data & AI practice will help our clients move from interest to action to value, and in a responsible way with clear business cases,” said Julie Sweet, Accenture’s chairwoman and CEO.

Also related/see:

Artificial intelligence creates 40,000 new roles at Accenture — from computerweekly.com by Karl Flinders
Accenture is planning to add thousands of AI experts to its workforce as part of a $3bn investment in its data and artificial intelligence practice

Why leaders need to evolve alongside generative AI — from fastcompany.com by Kelsey Behringer
Even if you’re not an educator, you should not be sitting on the sidelines watching the generative AI conversation being had around you—hop in.

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

Leaders should be careful to watch and support education right now. At the end of the day, the students sitting in K-12 and college classrooms are going to be future CPAs, lawyers, writers, and teachers. If you are parenting a child, you have skin in the game. If you use professional services, you have skin in the game. When it comes to education, we all have skin in the game.

Students need to master fundamental skills like editing, questioning, researching, and verifying claims before they can use generative AI exceptionally well.

GenAI & Education: Enhancement, not Replacement — from drphilippahardman.substack.com by Dr. Philipa Hardman
How to co-exist in the age of automation

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

[On 6/15/23, I joined] colleagues from OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Stanford, Harvard and other others at the first meeting of the GenAI Summit. Our shared goal [was] to help to educate universities & schools in Europe about the impact of Generative AI on their work.

how can we effectively communicate to education professionals that generative AI will enhance their work rather than replace them?

A recent controlled study found that ChatGPT can help professionals increase their efficiency in routine tasks by ~35%. If we keep in mind that the productivity gains brought by the steam engine in the nineteenth century was ~25%, this is huge.

As educators, we should embrace the power of ChatGPT to automate the repetitive tasks which we’ve been distracted by for decades. Lesson planning, content creation, assessment design, grading and feedback – generative AI can help us to do all of these things faster than ever before, freeing us up to focus on where we bring most value for our students.

Google, one of AI’s biggest backers, warns own staff about chatbots — from reuters.com by Jeffrey Dastin and Anna Tong

Excerpt:

SAN FRANCISCO, June 15 (Reuters) – Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O) is cautioning employees about how they use chatbots, including its own Bard, at the same time as it markets the program around the world, four people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The Google parent has advised employees not to enter its confidential materials into AI chatbots, the people said and the company confirmed, citing long-standing policy on safeguarding information.

The economic potential of generative AI: The next productivity frontier — from mckinsey.com
Generative AI’s impact on productivity could add trillions of dollars in value to the global economy—and the era is just beginning.



Preparing for the Classrooms and Workplaces of the Future: Generative AI in edX — from campustechnology.com by Mary Grush
A Q&A with Anant Agarwal


Adobe Firefly for the Enterprise — Dream Bigger with Adobe Firefly.
Dream it, type it, see it with Firefly, our creative generative AI engine. Now in Photoshop (beta), Illustrator, Adobe Express, and on the web.


Apple Vision Pro, Higher Education and the Next 10 Years — from insidehighered.com by Joshua Kim
How this technology will play out in our world over the next decade.



Zoom can now give you AI summaries of the meetings you’ve missed — from theverge.com by Emma Roth


Mercedes-Benz Is Adding ChatGPT to Cars for AI Voice Commands — from decrypt.co by Jason Nelson; via Superhuman
The luxury automaker is set to integrate OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot into its Mercedes-Benz User Experience (MBUX) feature in the U.S.


 

Professors Plan Summer AI Upskilling, With or Without Support — from insidehighered.com by Susan D’Agostino
Academics seeking respite from the fire hose of AI information and hot takes launch summer workshops. But many of the grass-roots efforts fall short of meeting demand.

Excerpt:

In these summer faculty AI workshops, some plan to take their first tentative steps in redesigning assignments to recognize the AI-infused landscape. Others expect to evolve their in-progress teaching-with-AI practices. At some colleges, full-time staff will deliver the workshops or pay participants for professional development time. But some offerings are grassroots efforts delivered by faculty volunteers attended by participants on their own time. Even so, many worry that the efforts will fall short of meeting demand.

From DSC:
We aren’t used to this pace of change. It will take time for faculty members — as well as Instructional Designers, Instructional Technologists, Faculty Developers, Learning Experience Designers, Librarians, and others — to learn more about AI and its implications for teaching and learning. Faculty are learning. Staff are learning. Students are learning. Grace is needed. And faculty/staff modeling what it is to learn themselves is a good thing for students to see as well.


Also relevant/see:

It takes a village… Reflections on sustainable learning design — from The Educationalist (educationalist.substack.com) by Alexandra Mihai

Excerpts:

This can be done first and foremost through collaboration, bringing more people at the table, in a meaningful workflow, whereby they can make the best use of their expertise. Moreover, we need to take a step back and keep the big picture in mind, if we want to provide our students with a valuable experience.

This is all about creating and nurturing partnerships. Thinking in an inclusive way about who is at the table when we design our courses and our programmes and who we are currently missing. Generally speaking, the main actors involved should be: teaching staff, learning design professionals (under all their various names) and students. Yes, students. Although we are designing for their learning, they are all too often not part of the process.

In order to yield results, collaborative practice needs to be embedded in the institutional fabric, and this takes time. Building silos happens fast, breaking them is a long term process. Creating a culture of dialogue, with clear and replicable processes is key to making collaborative learning design work.

From DSC:
To me, Alexandra is addressing the topic of using teams to design, develop, and teach/offer courses. This is where a variety of skills and specialties can come together to produce an excellent learning experience. No one individual has all of the necessary skills — nor the necessary time. No way.

 
© 2024 | Daniel Christian