Archive | April, 2026

No Need Rushing for AI in Education

20 Apr

By Thomas Ultican 4/20/2026

School districts throughout America are being pushed to spend huge dollars to implement artificial intelligence (AI). This Silicon Valley oligarch plan is much more about profits than good education. It is true that AI has great potential but for schools the known downsides are much larger than its present benefits. Education organizations – especially K-12 – should not spend money implementing AI at this time.

I am not the only one giving this counsel. The Brookins Institute released a report this January that concludes, “At this point in its trajectory, the risks of utilizing generative AI in children’s education overshadow its benefits.”  (Page 12)

The loudest and most positive commentators about AI in education all have links to tech industries. While not blatantly shilling for edtech, they present AI as inevitable and advise us about what we need to know to get it right. For example, University of San Diego’s Matt Evans wrote for the schools Professional and Continuing Education “The Role of Artificial Intelligence in Education: How Educators Can Succeed.”

The article is mostly an advertisement for the school’s AI in education master’s program. His article has several sub-headings like “Redefining Education in the Age of AI,” “The Evolving Role of Educators” and “How AI Is Reshaping Learning Institutions.” He does mention that there are some cons to AI like “Equity gaps” and “Overreliance.” In his article, Evans declares:

“We’re in a defining moment for education, where the systems we build today will influence generations of learners. To engage with AI constructively, educators and leaders must commit to continual learning and collaboration.”

He might not be right about that. The AI pitch looks suspiciously like the same education technology song and dance bombarding schools for more than a century. The claim is education technology will personalize learning and engage kids like never before.Teaching machines are not a new idea and their hundred-year-old promises are almost identical to promises we hear about with AI today. In the forward to her book, Teaching Machines, Audrey Watters wrote:

“Education phycologists like Sidney Pressey, the person often credited with inventing the first ‘teaching machine,’ talked about using mechanical devices in the 1920s in ways almost identical to those who push for personalized learning today, all so that, as Pressey put it, a teacher could focus on her ‘real function’ in the classroom: ‘inspirational and thought-stimulating activities,’ including giving each student individualized attention.”   

Algorithmic Decision-Making is Fueling Anxiety

The Dark Side of AI

Last October the Center for Democracy & Technology published “Hand in Hand: Schools’ Embrace of AI Connected to Increased Risks to Students.” It is a report based on survey data put together by Elizabeth Laird, Maddy Dwyer and Hannah Quay-de la Vallee. They opened the report:

“This report details the current status of AI use in schools along with four emerging risks associated with this technology, all of which increase the more that a school uses AI:

  • Data breaches or ransomware attacks;
  • Tech-enabled sexual harassment and bullying;
  • AI systems that do not work as intended; and
  • Troubling interactions between students and technology.”  (Page 5)

The report shares, among other outcomes, the following results.

  • 59% of parents believe AI is exposing children to inappropriate content. (Page 9)
  • 23% of teachers reported a large-scale data breach with AI. (Page 11)
  • 71% of teachers, 72% of parents and 64% of students believe AI is harming critical thinking skills and weakening key skillsets. (Page 22)
  • Deepfakes and non-consensual images of 12% of students are expanding sexual harassment and bullying. (Page 39)

The University of Illinois posted “AI in Schools: Pros and Cons” in October, 2024.Two of the cons they cited are quite significant: “high implementation costs” and “unpredictability and inaccurate information.” The article states, “Simple generative AI systems that teachers can use in lesson planning can cost as little as $25 a month, but larger adaptive learning systems can run in the tens of thousands of dollars.”  They also share, “If the data it draws from is inaccurate or biased, then the information it creates will be inaccurate or biased.”

Justin Reich wrote in the Conversation, “At MIT, I study the history and future of education technology, and I have never encountered an example of a school system – a country, state or municipality – that rapidly adopted a new digital technology and saw durable benefits for their students.”

The Brookins report made the same point as Reich. They cite a paper from the United Nations Education Scientific and Cultural Organization (2023), one by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (2015) and a paper by Amy West and Hanna Ring published by The International Education Journal: Comparative Perspectives (2023). Based on these papers, they asserted that education systems investing heavily in technology did not improve teaching and reading. (Page 11)

Brookins researchers bolstered this argument stating, “The mobile broadband example illustrates this pattern— while Internet expansion correlates with economic development, a study of 2.5 million 15-year-olds from 82 countries suggests that the rollout of 3G coverage from 2000-2018 produced statistically significant declines in math, reading, and science scores, as well as students’ social relationships and sense of belonging….” (Page 11)

These findings correspond exactly with what I observed in the classroom during that same period.

The Brookins paper notes that AI tools prompt “overreliance, emotional and cognitive dependence, and diminished critical thinking.” (Page 17)

The report also points out that “AI does not possess true intelligence; it operates through statistical pattern recognition rather than reasoning or comprehension.” In the consumer world, speed and engagement are valued over safety or learning. AI frequently hallucinates presenting false or nonsensical information. The paper states, “Student-facing tools often provide an ‘illusion of impact’: assumed to be high-value but frequently modeling poor pedagogy, misunderstanding how children learn, and perpetuating rote approaches….” (Page 123)

Last year, an American Psychological Association magazine claimed, “Much of the conversation so far about AI in education centers around how to prevent cheating—and ensure learning is actually happening—now that so many students are turning to ChatGPT for help.” Two big downsides to AI include students not thinking through problems and rampant cheating.

Benjamin Riley is a uniquely free thinker. He spent five years as policy director at NewSchool Venture Fund and founded Deans for Impact. His new effort is Cognitive Resonance which recently published “Education Hazards of Generative AI.” With his background, I was surprised to learn he does not parrot the billionaire line. A year ago Riley wrote:

“Using AI chatbots to tutor children is a terrible idea—yet here’s NewSchool Venture Fund and the Gates Foundation choosing to light their money on fire. There are education hazards of AI anywhere and everywhere you might choose to look—yet organization after organization within the Philanthro-Edu Industrial Complex continue to ignore or diminish this very present reality in favor of AI’s alleged “transformative potential” in the future. The notion that AI “democratizes” expertise is laughable as a technological proposition and offensive as a political aspiration, given the current neo-fascist activities of the American tech oligarchs—yet here’s John Bailey and friends still fighting to personalize learning using AI as rocket fuel.”

Conclusion

For more than thirty years, technology companies have looked to score big in the education sector. Instead of providing useful tools, they have schemed to take control of public education. At the onset of the twenty-first century, technologists claimed that putting kids at computers was a game changer and would fix everything plaguing public schools. Then they began promoting tablets with algorithmic lessons as providing better education than a human teacher. Today’s hoax is that artificial intelligence (AI) will make all these failures work. It is not just an expensive scam; it harms both children and America’s democratic future.

Tags: , , , , , ,

Billionaire Thinking has Harmed Public Schools

10 Apr

By Thomas Ultican 4/10/2026

Trump’s billionaire education leader, Linda McMahon, claimed on Fox News, “We’re doing terribly, I mean, our education system’s failed our kids.” Like a typical oligarch, she bolstered her point by mischaracterizing NAEP assessment levels stating, “only about 30% of high school and eighth graders can read proficiently or do math proficiently.” Maybe that sounds bad, but the reality is those numbers indicate that 30% of students are achieving at a high B or low A grade-level which sounds pretty good to me.

McMahon was promoting her nonpartisan “History Rocks!” tour. The sponsors of the tour are certainly not nonpartisan. They include America 250 Civics Education Coalition, led by pro-Trump America First Policy Institute which is composed of right-wing organizations such as Turning Point USA, Moms for Liberty and the Heritage Foundation.

However, even though standardized testing is a terrible method for evaluating schools and students, it is notable that the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) results have been falling since 2013.

The NAEP data plotted above is for all tested US students in 8th grade and 4th grade reading. Around 2013, results started dropping. Data for math also shows this same trend. Because education has so many variables, establishing a solid cause and effect relationship for this decline is impossible.

Based on my personal experience in the classroom and my years of observing education outcomes, I have developed a theory that at least partially explains the decline.

Education Technology

In the 1990s, I worked in Silicon Valley researching friction problems associated with computer equipment. Part of my assignment was to develop software that ran testing devices, gathered massive data sets and loaded them into a Microsoft data base which created reports that I shared with customers. Once the testing was setup and started, everything from then on was automated. I loved pushing technology and making it do things no one else had.

In 1999, I got tired of Silicon Valley. That is when I returned to San Diego and sought a teaching credential. At the time, I imagined being able to use my technology expertise in future classrooms. I had become genuinely excited about education technology (edtech).

I wish I could say my expectations were met but I cannot.

I discovered that instead of edtech driving exploration, it was aimed at controlling and replacing teachers.

As part of the master of education program at UCSD, we were sent to local schools to work with students. I went to a local high school to work with struggling math students in a recovery class. Students were assigned to work on computer presented math problems which were then graded by the computer.

As the education technology critique Audre Watters has observed:

“Just because it’s a worksheet on an iPad doesn’t mean it’s transformational or exciting. It’s still a worksheet.”

In retrospect, this experience was an early effort to replace teachers with computer screens. Instead of working on making edtech an exciting addition to education, the effort was pointed toward putting kids at screens instead learning from teachers. The technology industry was promising to reduce the need for costly teachers.

Physics Lab Class

This picture shows an example of using technology to engage students in authentic learning. Two photogates affixed to the ramp were accurate to + or – 0.001 seconds. Here the students were adjusting the ramp to achieve constant velocity when a marble rolled down the ramp. The photogates provided data including the time for test object to roll through the gate and the time between gates. Since students new the diameter of the test ball and the distance between the gates, they were able to calculate three velocities. Once the three velocities were all equal, they changed to a test ball with identical geometry but significantly less mass. They were then able to observe that the mass of the ball did not change the velocity which accorded with Galileo Galilei’s 1589 experiment testing mass and gravity.

Unfortunately, only small companies were working to develop engaging technology for learning. Larger companies were developing school management systems that gathered large data sets on all students and teachers. Or they were creating schemes where teachers created lessons on their platforms which then claimed ownership of the lessons.

The school district I was in bought every student an I-pad and then three years later replaced those I-pads with laptop computers. Because these devices were such a classroom distraction, teachers often required students to put them in their backpacks and store them under their desks.

It was worse than a waste of money. It was undermining learning.

 In my AP physics classes, students were not working through the assigned problems. They discovered that almost all physics problems had a worked-out example on line. I was getting the most beautiful work I had ever seen but the students were clueless when tested.

It seems fair to identify edtech as a possible cause for declining test scores. Artificial intelligence will likely make — not working or thinking — an even bigger problem.

Science of Reading

The Orwellian labeled science of reading (SoR) is not based on sound science. In 1997, congress passed legislation calling for a reading study. Establishment of the National Reading Panel (NRP) was a doomed effort from the beginning. It was a massive undertaking, conducted by twenty-one unpaid volunteers over 18-months. NRP fundamentally did a meta-analysis in five reading domains, ignoring 10 other important domains. They did not review everything and there was no new research. Their report is the basis for SoR.

In Fact-Checking the Science of Reading, professors Robert J. Tierney and P David Pearson share that science is a natural commitment to modesty “is always provisional; ever-ready to be tweaked, revised, or replaced by the next theoretical insight or empirical findings.” As Reinking, Hruby and Risko (2023) stated “settled science is an oxymoron.” In the case of SoR, not only is it not settled science, many literacy researchers believe it is a substandard approach to teaching reading.

SoR is a dressed-up version of George W. Bush’s Reading First Initiative from 2001. In 2008, The Center for Public Integrity reported, “An April 2008 study revealed the general ineffectiveness of Reading First and found that students in schools receiving funds for the program had no better reading skills than children in schools that did not.”

Unfortunately, the spending on SoR by people like Laurene Powell Jobs is causing benighted legislators to mandate it. Forty states have already adopted reading education laws complying with billionaire wishes.

The real reason for promoting SoR is resting control of education away from universities and ending democratically run schools. The agenda is for all teacher education and training to be privatized. Organizations like TNTP and Relay Graduate School are substandard oligarch  financed entities with political clout. They are designed to replace public institutions.  

SoR advocates are trying to force everyone to use a reading education approach that is not proven and failed miserably in England.

Nancy Bailey opened her recent post:

“Today’s Science of Reading (SOR) was born of a right-wing conservative phonics focus. A Nation at Risk helped advance that messaging….”

“As the country mandates the Science of Reading (SOR) and invests heavily in unproven programs, marketing disputes flourish over which best align with so-called evidence. These programs control teachers’ instruction through one-size-fits-all directives, delivered with manuals or online. It’s easy to see where this is going. States could spend millions more on reading programs that don’t appear to improve learning as teachers are driven out with tech.”

Since around 2011 or 2012, the reading industry has been spending to change how reading is taught. Sarah Schwartz wrote in EducationWeek:

“The shifts in reading teaching that many states are asking schools to make go beyond simply adding a few new practices to teachers’ toolboxes. Instead, the “science of reading” asks teachers and leaders to adopt a new framework of how skilled reading develops—and what educators need to do to support that process.”

As more and more private companies produce reading materials that are mandated for use in many states, NAEP reading scores have continuously slid down. This is not a clearly known cause and effect occurrence but it does seem to be a reasonable conjecture that SoR is harming student learning.

Conclusion

The more teachers are scripted, the more they have their autonomy diminished, the more private companies are selling education reading products into schools, the more kids are put at screens to learn, the worse the outcomes. This is why I believe NAEP scores have been falling since 2013.

Tags: , , , , , , ,