[ashton314]

> “All educational content is obsolete. Every textbook, every lesson plan, every test, all of it is obsolete because gen AI is going to be able to deliver a personalized lesson just for you,” Joe Liemandt, Alpha School’s “principal” and the founder of Trilogy, the company that owns many of the apps used by Alpha School, said in a podcast interview published last year.

I wonder if this fellow has ever read a serious book. I'm skeptical.

[yoyohello13]

Hell, why learn History? The AI can just make a personalized History for you!

[bronco21016]

Ugh, don't give the AI or wanna-be authoritarians ideas.

[kanbankaren]

I have. Around 20 non-fiction and technical books in about 15 years and I agree with this Joe guy.

AI is going to disrupt the whole academia and it is infinitely better than a book or a teacher.

The student could move at his/her own pace and can ask questions if stuck which no book or teacher could deliver.

[shimman]

I'm highly skeptical of someone bragging about barely reading a book year to then say AI is going to disrupt education as an authoritative voice. Do you honestly know any teachers or have children in public education? These takes are truly baffling. It's right up there with believing InfoWars as sound politics.

edit: to try and sound "nicer," would anyone seriously take any advice about software engineering from someone who uses a WYSIWYG editor? That's how the above comment reads.

[johnnyanmac]

>and it is infinitely better than a book or a teacher.

why do you think that?

>The student could move at his/her own pace and can ask questions if stuck which no book or teacher could deliver.

You're assuming there's a driven student who already knows what they wish to pursue. Even in college I wasn't entirely sure what domain in tech I wanted to explore.

You're also assuming or dismissing the other factors a teacher offers. Networks, parental guidance, wisdom of how to navigate through college or a job market, or simply as emotional pillar in ways parents can't always be.

Most of all, teachers teach you to understand bias and expand your viewpoints past any one given source. That's why I read the parental review of this school on top of this piece. It seems against current coporate interests to offer that. There's no one clear answer to everything out there, but AI wants it to appear as so.

[ashton314]

> Around 20 non-fiction and technical books in about 15 years

That's not lot, mate. Maybe more than the average American unfortunately, but I consider a year where I get through 2–3 books a slow one. And that's just reading I do outside of my job. What matters, of course, is both the quality and quantity of what you read. The short of it is, your attempt at building your ethos has fallen pretty flat here.

> AI is going to disrupt the whole academia [sic]

Yes, it has and it continues to. I'm not arguing against that. Joe Liemandt said that "all educational content is obsolete", which presumably includes not only textbooks like SICP or Sipser's Introduction to the Theory of Computation (just listing some CS textbooks because I'm in CS) but also great works of literature and philosophy that are important texts like The Odyssey or A Tale of Two Cities. If he meant to exclude such texts from the umbrella of "all educational content", well, then that's telling too. :)

> …it is infinitely better than a book or a teacher.

Maybe for someone who struggles with literacy or who hasn't had the pleasure of a good teacher. If you really believe this I'd like to see you try to substantiate your claim.

> The student could move at his/her own pace…

The article is about a grade school kids who, most of the time, need a little pushing to reach their full potential.

> …ask questions if stuck which no book or teacher could deliver.

… you're saying that LLMs are better than teachers because you can ask LLMs questions and not teachers?! Also, asking questions isn't the only component of learning. A good teacher will know when to not answer a question (or ask one!) and let the student stew and think about it.

I'm not saying AI can help with education. It can—it helps me!—but no hallucinating stochastic machine will have the human insight that a good teacher has. It's not a replacement.

[yoyohello13]

I still find books valuable because they give you a structure and physical location to anchor learning. They give you an overview of the whole topic you're interested in.

Whenever I need to learn a new topic I always try to buy a book on the subject because it so much faster to have someone do the scaffolding for you than trying to be 'self-directed' about it. It also give some confidence that you aren't leaving big holes in your understanding.

[BobaFloutist]

What? The textbook+teacher combo literally provides exactly that.

The textbook allows you to move at your own pace, acting as a structured reference and practice tool that you can review endlessly outside of class.

And the teacher can answer any questions you've confirmed you're not able to resolve on your own with the textbook. Some in class, some during office hours/before or after class, and some via email.

[glitchc]

Maybe the school system failed him.

[dyauspitr]

I have long conversation threads on highly specialized topics and I’ve never found learning about something so easy. He’s right but it has to not be self directed in some way because that takes motivation and you cant expect that from every student.