Yet another expensive high-tech school opening in NYC - now with the promise of AI learning

Wow. A branch of the Alpha school is opening up as K-8 private school in downtown NYC at 180 Maiden Lane in the fall in which students will be taught academic subjects for only two  hours per day via an AI platform at a cost of $65K; what a bargain! 

More on this teacher-less chain of schools, founded by a MacKenzie Price, a Texas businesswoman with no previous experience in education, who claims that her model will  "ensure mastery of the material 2-5x faster than traditional method".  Peter Greene reported on this woman and her chain of schools when she applied to open up a cyber online charter school, called Unbound Academic Institute Charter School, in Pennsylvania. 

The Pennsylvania Department of Education wisely rejected the school, explaining that "the school received no letters of support, was not insured in any capacity, and pointed to issues relating to how the school’s address in Lancaster, a coworking space, lacked certain facility requirements."

The rejection letter also pointed out that "The artificial intelligence instructional model being proposed by this school is untested and fails to demonstrate how the tools, methods and providers would ensure alignment to Pennsylvania academic standards,” an understatement if I've ever heard one.

As Fred Aebli, a professor at Penn State pointed out, "at the end of it all, teaching is by far one of the most human things that we do, especially in K through 12. They’re (kids are) not just learning reading, writing and arithmetic, they’re learning people skills, and life skills.”  

Perhaps that's why the proposed daily schedule for the private school in NYC includes an afternoon session devoted to teach "Limitless life skills", such as riding a bike.

But haven't we heard this story before?  Remember the Altschools, just a few years ago?  The much hyped, high-tech, for-profit private school chain opened with four schools in the Bay Area and in NYC, starting in 2013, and yet closed their doors just a few years later,  after losing as much as $174 million in venture capital funds from Mark Zuckerberg & other tech mavens.  

Or Summit Learning , another multi- million dollar effort by Zuckerberg, that put kids on computers for much of the school day, with inadequate materials and little human teaching.   

After a number of exposes, in the NY Times, the NY Post and elsewhere,  showing a huge amount of student and parent discontent with the program, its founder, Diane Taverner, left Summit for other ventures, and the organization renamed itself "Gradient Learning,"   

In its recent materials, its operators claim that their program is based on "Whole Student teaching," whatever that means,  and that "we've been diligently listening to your feedback and working closely with educators to identify areas to enrich."  How many schools have adopted and stuck with the program, versus the countless number that have abandoned it,  is unclear.

With the rise of AI, however, we should expect the number of schools and programs claiming great results using this technology will only grow.  How much of that will be based on grift and hype, and how much on actual learning will be critical for all of us who care about the future of education to study and carefully dissect.  One thing for sure, the Alpha School won't be a shining exemplar of AI's potential.

Spending Sunday with Tim Walz on his birthday & the wonderful Network for Public Education conference

The annual conference of Network for Public Education, on whose board I sit, was held last weekend in Columbus, Ohio.  It was terrific as usual, with wonderful speeches and incisive and illuminating workshops and panel discussions on how to strengthen our public schools and protect them from the depredations of budget cuts, privatization, and censorship.

But the highlight for me and many others was Tim Walz' inspiring keynote address on Sunday afternoon, where he spoke about how we have to fight Trump's attempt to dismantle and defund our public schools. An article about his speech is here, though the article underestimates the numbers in the audience and the response: there were actually about 350 people there, including state legislators, Commissioners of Education, educators, parents, and advocates, who were ecstatic to hear him speak.

Walz was introduced by Randi Weingarten, who was introduced by Diane Ravitch.  Diane approvingly noted how earlier, Randi had been called "the most dangerous person in the world" by Mike Pompeo.

Randi said that we cannot give into the "autocrats who want to bully people into silence," and asked what does it mean when the President "wants to destroy the only federal agency devoted to education."

She noted it was Tim Walz' birthday, and after he stepped up to the dais, she presented him with a cake and we all sang him Happy Birthday.

Both Tim Walz and Randi hailed the protest rallies and marches the had occurred nationwide the day before, demanding that Trump and Musk take their "Hands Off" our democracy and our schools.  Tim Walz assured us that we aren't overreacting, since "The road to authoritarianism is littered to people saying you’re overreacting." 

He added: "People say that they’re not into politics but I say that  politics are into you. When I’m asked who’s leading the Democratic Party I say they’re in the streets like yesterday."  

Walz pointed out that the takeover of our public schools is being engineered by the oligarchs -- though "we shouldn't call them oligarchs but greedy bastards."  He also said that the middle class was built in the US by our public education system and the unions.

Of course, I did get a selfie with Walz -- and when I introduced myself, I said I was from Class Size Matters.  As a long time teacher, he immediately responded, "yes it does!"  I added that he was the best thing to come out of the 2024 election, and he replied, "You're too kind."  As opposed to so many politicians, he truly comes off as the warmest, most humble human being -- and funny besides.

Earlier that day,  I had been a presenter at a workshop on the risks of AI in the classroom, along with Cassie Creswell from Illinois Families for Public Schools, and co-chair along with me of the Parent Coalition for Student Privacy.  Concluding the workshop with eclat was the retired teacher, brilliant blogger and education guru Peter Greene.  Our presentation is below.