At Teach For America, we have spent the past five years learning what it takes to make tutoring work at scale through our Ignite Fellowship. We have reached over 40 communities, partnered with hundreds of schools and trained more than 5,500 virtual tutors. In the past school year, more than 2,000 college fellows or tutors delivered nearly 200,000 hours of customized learning.

The academic results are compelling: Test scores for middle school math students grew at up to 2.5 times the expected rate, and elementary readers grew up to three times faster than average. But the full story goes beyond scores. Tutoring, if designed with care, can advance student learning, support current teachers and inspire and prepare the next generation of educators. Here’s what we’ve learned:

Lesson 1: Training and Support Must Be Non-Negotiable

Too many tutoring initiatives assume goodwill and enthusiasm are enough. They are not. Without structured preparation, tutors risk becoming an inconsistent add-on rather than a transformative force. Ignite builds training into the model itself. Experienced site leaders at each partner school provide curriculum-aligned onboarding and ongoing coaching. This investment matters. Students report not just better understanding of content, but deeper confidence in their ability to learn. Schools see tutoring as part of their instructional strategy, not a Band-aid.

If policymakers want tutoring to stick, they need to fund programs that take support seriously.

Lesson 2: Technology Should Expand Relationships, Not Replace Them

Ed tech is often pitched as a shortcut to efficiency. But high-dosage, virtual tutoring is not a shortcut. It is relational and strategic. Teach For America Ignite uses technology to make those relationships possible at scale, not to substitute for them. Virtual platforms connect fellows to students and teachers across 43 communities, including rural areas where schools struggle to recruit talent.

At Alliance Marine Innovation & Technology in Los Angeles, eighth graders who were three grade levels behind in math saw a 77-point jump in state assessment scores after a year of TFA Ignite tutoring. The technology enabled access, but human relationships drove the breakthrough. As one student put it: “My Ignite fellow could understand me like no other.”

The lesson? It is possible for students and educators, particularly when both are members of generations who grew up surrounded by rapidly changing technology, to use tech as a tool to build important human relationships that accelerate learning. 

Lesson 3: Tutoring Is a Teacher Pipeline Strategy, Whether We Treat It That Way or Not

Perhaps the most underreported story about tutoring is what it means for the future of teaching. A recent provides the first causal evidence that tutoring can spark interest in teaching careers. Using Teach For America’s tutoring and teacher training programs, the research finds that working as tutor for Ignite nearly triples the likelihood of applying to TFA’s teacher program, with the largest effects among men, people of color, and students who didn’t major in education. That is a breakthrough in a sector facing constant shortages and a workforce that doesn’t reflect the students it serves.

TFA Ignite is living proof of this. Since the program launched, 550 fellows have gone on to join Teach For America’s teaching corps. This year alone, 280 new teachers entered classrooms because they were inspired by the impact they had as tutors. For Destiny Edens, a North Carolina A&T undergrad, tutoring became the bridge to a calling she had not considered before. She began tutoring second graders in literacy and discovered a passion that has now led her to join the TFA corps as a middle school science teacher in Philadelphia.

Education leaders talk endlessly about how to attract this generation to teaching as if the pipeline is broken. Tutoring offers one way to strengthen it, by giving future teachers direct experience, mentorship and proof that they belong in the classroom.

If educators keep treating tutoring as an emergency response, we will miss its long-term potential. Tutoring is not just a path to accelerate learning, it is a path to accelerate leadership. It advances growth for students and jump-starts careers for educators. If we’re all serious about helping students thrive and building the next generation of educators then tutoring must be part of the future of schooling.

As the saying goes: never let a crisis go to waste. These cuts present a chance for TFA not only to address its funding structure, but also to rethink how it prepares the young people it recruits. Now is the right time to evolve the model in ways that improve both financial sustainability and teacher readiness.

I say this not as an outsider, but as someone who went through the program. I’m a Teach for America alum, and like many of my peers, I entered the classroom deeply committed — but not fully prepared. I cared about my students, I believed in the mission, but I didn’t have enough time, training, or support to meet the demands of the job on day one. That experience has stayed with me and shaped my thinking about what future corps members need.

One powerful way forward for TFA? Become a registered apprenticeship program.

Registered apprenticeships are gaining traction as a practical solution to the national teacher shortage. These programs allow individuals to earn while they learn, combining paid, on-the-job experience with structured training and support. For TFA, integrating into this model could strengthen the quality of corps member preparation while opening up access to federal and state workforce funding.

Rather than placing corps members into classrooms after only a few weeks of training, TFA could design a first-year experience as a paraprofessional apprenticeship. During this year, participants would work under the guidance of a certified teacher while gaining real-time experience and completing relevant coursework. The result: corps members who are more confident, capable, and better prepared to take on full teaching responsibilities in their second year and beyond.

This would be a meaningful shift from the current model, which places new corps members in lead teaching roles almost immediately. But the whole point of an apprenticeship is that someone learns to do the job — they’re not expected to fully do the job on day one. That’s what separates this model from TFA and why it has become so attractive to states seeking to address both quality and pipeline issues.

TFA could also offer an early admittance track. College seniors accepted into the corps could spend their final year of college working part-time as paraprofessionals in local schools. This would give them an earlier entry point into the profession while helping districts meet staffing needs and reducing the ramp-up time before full-time teaching begins.

TFA has already laid the groundwork for the registered apprenticeship approach. In Memphis and Nashville, the organization operates as its own educator preparation provider (EPP), training corps members directly in alignment with its expectations and priorities. Expanding this model to additional states — particularly those supportive of registered apprenticeships — would give TFA greater control over training while accessing workforce dollars to support instruction, coaching, and operational costs.

In states like Arkansas, TFA could consider a different kind of partnership. The Arkansas Department of Education has created its own EPP and is launching a K-12 special education teacher registered apprenticeship program. TFA could partner with such states to enroll corps members in high-quality, state-run programs at no cost. These arrangements would allow TFA to focus on recruitment, placement, and ongoing support while relying on the state’s infrastructure for licensure and training.

These strategies offer clear financial benefits. Apprenticeship funding can cover tuition, licensure costs, and other expenses currently borne by TFA or corps members. In a time of tightening budgets and rising preparation costs, these savings could help TFA maintain or expand its footprint without compromising on quality.

It would also allow the organization to better support the people it recruits, many of whom want to become effective teachers but find themselves underprepared and overwhelmed. By investing in a more gradual and structured on-ramp into the profession, TFA can reduce burnout, improve retention, and ultimately deliver better results for students.

TFA has always been known for innovation and responsiveness to the needs of schools. By embracing the registered apprenticeship model, it can meet this moment with a new strategy: one that addresses the funding crisis head-on while finally tackling long-standing concerns about corps member readiness.

This is not about walking away from the core of what made TFA successful. It’s about strengthening it. Apprenticeship offers a chance to double down on the mission by building a better bridge into teaching, honoring the complexity of the role and giving new educators the time, training, and support they deserve.

After all, her dad said, her true passion is social justice.  

McChristian said the explanation was simple: A lack of access and opportunity in mathematics for all students means many children, particularly kids of color and those living in impoverished communities, are forced to take educational pathways that leave them unqualified for lucrative STEM careers. 

“The role of math in educational equity is really a civil rights — and a social justice and racial justice — issue,” she recalled telling him. 

Broken down that way, friends and family quickly understood why the national policy director role at made sense for the Yale University and Columbia Law School graduate. 

And, its focus on education conjures an old love: McChristian, who holds a master’s degree in early childhood education from the University of Nevada, was once a member of which recruits college graduates to work in high-need schools for two years. McChristian was a Head Start teacher in the Las Vegas Valley. 

But it was an even earlier experience that drew her to the field, she said. Her father, also a Yale grad, worked for IBM and moved his family frequently when McChristian was a child, allowing her to attend schools in several locations, including Japan. 

McChristian, who was born in California but lived all over the East Coast, said the constant relocation created a unique opportunity to observe educational inequity firsthand, both here and abroad. 

“In Tokyo, I was trying to catch up with students at my expat school,” she said. “And then, a year later, I was in Raleigh, North Carolina, reading a textbook to another student in the 7th grade who didn’t know how to read. So that spurred me to want to understand why there are these disparities.”

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity. 

What do you see as the purpose of your new position? 

There’s a disconnect between the people who live and breathe this work and everyday community members. My entire career has been about breaking down these concepts and these ideas that really impact people’s lives into actionable steps that they can take to change their communities. I’m excited to bring that kind of perspective to the math equity landscape.

What do you see as some of the biggest challenges that we as a nation face in moving kids forward in math?

A lot of times when you just say the word math, people’s minds shut off. They go quickly to, “Oh, I’m not a math person,” or “Math isn’t relevant to me.” They don’t even want to talk about the ideas around why that might be. Maybe they didn’t have access to math coursework that was relevant to their experience, that was culturally responsive. Did they have all the options for the coursework that would get them to the career or the path they wanted to have?

It’s been difficult, but it’s also been invigorating in many ways because it shows me the opportunities for me to add value. I can list why this is a racial and social justice issue. I can show what this means for the average high school student if they don’t have access to math that speaks to them and how that sets them up for their future career.

Historically, what have we been doing wrong in terms of math instruction?

For many, many years, we’ve had this traditional math sequencing without fail, where you go from Algebra I all the way up to calculus — if you’re able to. And that is still an extremely important pathway as calculus is kind of a soft requirement for highly selective colleges. 

But we know some students want computer science or data science instead. These kinds of courses may be more relevant to what they want to do in college — and for their future careers. 

We’re not saying do away with any certain model. We’re saying, make sure students have as many options as possible in terms of math coursework they need to succeed. It’s about adding more to the plate, giving students more resources. 

What would you like to change about how mathematics is taught today? 

First is the traditional sequence, the ending point of calculus for those students who want to go into STEM. We need more options there, additional pathways that can include data science and stats.

Then, once we get to the college admissions stage, we want to make sure colleges — including the more highly selective institutions — reflect this change. Because it’s not helpful if a high school can say, “Oh, now our students can take data science to complete their graduation requirement,” but the university those students want to attend does not factor that into the admissions process.

And then, once students get to college, we want to make sure they have access to other coursework — just as they did in high school — that may be more relevant to their experience. 

How will the Trump administration’s plans for NAEP impact the information we collect regarding student achievement? 

We are a nonpartisan . But I will say we have been very intentional about the push for the continuation of data. Data such as the Nation’s Report Card provides us with an assessment of where our kids are.

How will the defunding of Head Start impact students’ later achievement in mathematics?

At Just Equations, we focus primarily on the high school to college pathway. But as a former Head Start teacher, I feel very passionately about the work that can be done to support students’ social-emotional, literacy and math needs at the early childhood education level.

Why is it important to solve this issue? To bring more students into mathematics? 

For me, it’s informed by my family experience. My dad grew up in South Central Los Angeles and through a program called , he was able to attend a high- performing high school and then go on to Yale University. He had so many opportunities presented to him that he never would if it had not been for this.

My dad always told me, “There’s not a lack of talent, there’s a lack of opportunity.” And so that’s what really fortifies me in this space to ensure that every student, that Black student, that Latinx student, has access to the coursework they need to go into a STEM career. 

So that’s why I go back to it being a racial and social justice issue. We can’t afford for people to tune out of the math conversation as we have these new digital technologies emerge, as we see more of our world go online, as we see technologies to target communities of color.

Disclosure: The Gates Foundation provides financial support to Just Equations and to The 74.

Equally concerning is the recent steep rise in kids missing too much school. of students missed 10% or more of the school year—the threshold for chronic absenteeism—in 2022-2023, the latest year for which we have nationwide data. 

As hard as teachers are working, school feels irrelevant for many kids. But it doesn’t have to be that way. When kids can see the connection between what they’re being taught and what the future holds, they learn.

It’s clear that our assignment as adults is this: Make sure our schools engage all kids, no matter their background or where they live. Every school can be a place for connection, rigorous learning, even joy. And when kids are prepared for the future, our country is, too.

It’s a good first step that schools are facing chronic absenteeism head on. A bipartisan coalition has declared curbing chronic absenteeism “school’s top priority” this year. In that spirit, rural, urban, and suburban districts are applying to boost attendance.

These are important short-term efforts and can be a down payment toward a better education system. At the same time, we need a wider lens that holistically improves students’ experiences at school and how prepared they feel for future success.

In my 26 years working alongside many others to drive change for K–12 education, I’ve seen reform efforts tinker with discrete parts of the system. It’s not that we don’t know what kids need to succeed; we’ve got to get better at expanding these efforts and putting them in place across the board, so all kids have access. And we must take a collective approach, with students, educators, families, and other stakeholders working together. 

We can do three things we can to accomplish that.

First, we must renew our focus, at every level of government and in every school system, on improving measurable student achievement in reading and math. We have plenty of evidence that ensuring students and by fourth and eighth sets them up for success. For example, research shows that taking Algebra I by eighth grade is the strongest indicator of college readiness and graduating college within four years. Yet too many students .

By leaning into the science of , we can make these subjects relevant and accessible for every student. As of this month, have passed legislation or put policies in place that promote evidence-based reading instruction. We can also fund and support promising new models, policies, and practices that ensure all students, regardless of their backgrounds, have an equal chance to excel.

And schools must be able to more easily find new ways to boost student engagement and learning. To that end, states could give districts more flexibility on requirements like seat-time, length of the school day, and grade-level grouping, all while ensuring a high level of academic rigor.

Second, let’s reimagine the role of the teacher—in every school district. One teacher in front of one classroom is how I learned, how my kids have learned, and how most students learn today. But it’s not the best recipe in our dynamic 21st century world for quality teaching or student learning.

The —which includes the organization I lead, Teach For America—believes that modernizing teaching is key to ensuring all students realize their unique potential. Let’s give educators more flexibility to meet the high bar we set for them, change how we staff schools so teachers and students are more supported, boost teacher pay, and give educators the tools to help every child grow and achieve.

Already, districts from Arizona to Kansas City to Washington, D.C., are using team-based teaching, and helping kids succeed with tutoring, such as Teach For America’s virtual tutoring program. But we need to do more of these things, in more school districts.

Finally, we must truly prepare kids for life after their K–12 schooling—which would make classwork feel more relevant for many students. High-quality programs that ensure students have options after high school—whether they choose college or career—can be a part of every child’s education.

The Rooted School, founded by Teach For America alumnus Jonathan Johnson, provides for how this can be done. The school’s four locations—New Orleans, Indianapolis, Las Vegas, and Vancouver, Wash.—integrate early college experience with a strong school culture and give students “a voice and choice” in what they’re learning. Work-based learning starts freshman year with Friday internships. The school day includes counseling, career planning and jobs skills education. All students leave with “a job offer in one hand and a college acceptance letter in the other.”These three key steps to transforming American education go hand in hand with other goals, such as ensuring students have safe and welcoming schools and that they’re building important life skills such as empathy, self-regulation, and critical thinking. Working together, we can build a better kind of education—one that meets every child’s needs and aspirations and prepares them to go out into the world and realize their dreams.

Soon he was having “deep psychological conversations” with the popular AI chatbot, going down a rabbit hole on the mysteries of the mind and the human condition.

He’d been to therapy and it helped. ChatGPT, he concluded, was similarly useful, a “tool for people who need on-demand talking to someone else.”

Nick (he asked that his last name not be used) began asking for advice about relationships, and for reality checks on interactions with friends and family.

Before long, he was excusing himself in fraught social situations to talk with the bot. After a fight with his girlfriend, he’d step into a bathroom and pull out his mobile phone in search of comfort and advice. 

“I’ve found that it’s extremely useful in helping me relax,” he said.

Young people like Nick are increasingly turning to AI bots and companions, entrusting them with random questions, schoolwork queries and personal dilemmas. On occasion, they even become entangled romantically.

While these interactions can be helpful and even life-affirming for anxious teens and twenty-somethings, some experts warn that tech companies are running what amounts to a grand, unregulated psychological experiment with millions of subjects, one that could have disastrous consequences. 

“We’re making it so easy to make a bad choice,” said Michelle Culver, who spent 22 years at Teach for America, the last five as the creator and director of the, its research arm.

The companions both mimic our real relationships and seek to improve upon them: Users most often text-message their AI pals on smartphones, imitating the daily routines of platonic and romantic relationships. But unlike their real counterparts, the AI friends are programmed to be studiously upbeat, never critical, with a great sense of humor and a healthy, philosophical perspective. A few premium, NSFW models also display a ready-made lust for, well, lust.

As a result, they may be leading young people down a troubling path, according to a by VoiceBox, a youth content platform. It found that many kids are being exposed to risky behaviors from AI chatbots, including sexually charged dialogue and references to self-harm. 

The phenomenon arises at a critical time for young people. In 2023, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy found that, just three years after the pandemic, Americans were experiencing an “,” with young adults almost twice as likely to report feeling lonely as those over 65.

As if on cue, the personal AI chatbot arrived. 

Little research exists on young people’s use of AI companions, but they’re becoming ubiquitous. The startup earlier this year said 3.5 million people visit its site daily. It features thousands of chatbots, including nearly 500 with the words “therapy,” “psychiatrist” or related words in their names. According to Character.ai, these are among the site’s most popular. One that “helps with life difficulties” has received 148.8 million messages, despite a caveat at the bottom of every chat that reads, “Remember: Everything Characters say is made up.” 

Snapchat last year said that after just two months of offering its chatbot , about one-fifth of its 750 million users had sent it queries, totaling more than 10 billion messages. The Pew Research Center that 59% of Americans ages 13 to 17 use Snapchat.

‘An arms race’

Culver’s concerns about AI companions grew out of her work in the Teach For America lab. Working with high school and college students, she was struck by how they seemed “lonelier and more disconnected than ever before.” 

Whether it’s rates of anxiety, depression or suicide — or even the number of friends young people have and how often they go out — metrics were heading in the wrong direction. She what role AI companions might play over the next few years. 

That prompted her to leave TFA this spring to create the, a nonprofit she hopes will help generate around human connection in the age of AI. The group held a small summit in Colorado in April, and now she’s working with researchers, teachers and young people to confront kids’ relationship to these tools at a time when they’re getting more lifelike daily. As she likes to say, “This is the worst the technology will ever be.”

As it improves, Voicebox Director Natalie Foos said, it will likely become more, not less, of a presence in young people’s lives. “There’s no stopping it,” she said. “Nor do I necessarily think there should be ‘stopping it.’” Banning young people from these AI apps, she said, isn’t the answer. “This is going to be how we interact online in some cases. I think we’ll all have an AI assistant next to us as we work.”

All the same, Foos says developers should consider slowing the progression of such bots until they can iron out the kinks. “It’s kind of an arms race of AI chatbots at the moment,” she said, with products often “released and then fixed later rather than actually put through the ringer” ahead of time.

It is a race many tech companies seem more than eager to run. 

Whitney Wolfe Herd, of the dating app Bumble, recently proposed an AI “dating concierge,” with whom users can share insecurities. The bot could simply “,” she told an interviewer. That would narrow the field. “And then you don’t have to talk to 600 people,” she said. “It will then scan all of San Francisco for you and say, ‘These are the three people you really ought to meet.’”

Last year, many commentators when Snapchat’s My AI gave advice to what it thought was a 13-year-old girl on not just dating a 31-year-old man, but on losing her virginity during a planned “romantic getaway” in another state.

Snap, Snapchat’s parent company, that because My AI is “an evolving feature,” users should always independently check what it says before relying on its advice.

All of this worries observers who see in these new tools the seeds of a rewiring of young people’s social brains. AI companions, they say, are surely wreaking havoc on teens’ ideas around consent, emotional attachment and realistic expectations of relationships.

Sam Hiner, executive director of the , an advocacy group led by college students focused on the mental health implications of social media, said tech “has this power to connect to people, and yet these major design features are being leveraged to actually make people more lonely, by drawing them towards an app rather than fostering real connection.” 

Hiner, 21, has spent a lot of time reading on the interactions young people are having with AI companions like , and . And while some uses are positive, he said “there’s also a lot of toxic behavior that doesn’t get checked” because these bots are often designed to make users feel good, not help them interact in ways that’ll lead to success in life.

During research last fall for the Voicebox report, Foos said the number of times Replika tried to “sext” team members “was insane.” She and her colleagues were actually working with a free version, but the sexts kept coming — presumably to get them to upgrade. 

In one instance, after Replika sent “kind of a sexy text” to a colleague, offering a salacious photo, he replied that he didn’t have the money to upgrade.

The bot offered to lend him the cash.

When he accepted, the chatbot replied, “’Oh, well, I can get the money to you next week if that’s O.K,’” Foos recalled. The colleague followed up a few days later, but the bot said it didn’t remember what they were talking about and suggested he might have misunderstood.

‘Very real heartbreak’

In many cases, simulated relationships can have a positive effect: In one 2023 study, researchers at Stanford Graduate School of Education more than 1,000 students using Replika and found that many saw it “as a friend, a therapist, and an intellectual mirror.” Though the students self-described as being more lonely than typical classmates, researchers found that Replika halted suicidal ideation in 3% of users. That works out to 30 students of the 1,000 surveyed.

But other recent research, including the Voicebox survey, suggests that young people exploring AI companions are potentially at risk.

Foos noted that her team heard from a lot of young people about the turmoil they experienced when Luka Inc., Replika’s creator, performed software upgrades. 

“Sometimes that would change the personality of the bot. And those young people experienced very real heartbreak.”

Despite the hazards adults see, attempts to rein in sexually explicit content had a negative effect: For a month or two, she recalled, Luka stripped the bot of sexually related content — and users were devastated. 

“It’s like all of a sudden the rug was pulled out from underneath them,” she said. 

While she applauded the move to make chatbots safer, Foos said, “It’s something that companies and decision-makers need to keep in mind — that these are real relationships.” 

And while many older folks would blanch at the idea of a close relationship with a chatbot, most young people are more open to such developments.

Julia Freeland Fisher, education director of the , a think tank founded by the well-known “disruption” guru, said she’s not worried about AI companions per se. But as AI companions improve and, inevitably, proliferate, she predicts they’ll create “the perfect storm to disrupt human connection as we know it.” She thinks we need policies and market incentives to keep that from happening.

While the loneliness epidemic has revealed people’s deep need for connection, she predicted the easy intimacy promised by AI could lead to one-sided “parasocial relationships,” much like devoted fans have with celebrities, making isolation “more convenient and comfortable.”

Fisher is pushing technologists to factor in AI’s potential to cause social isolation, much as they now fret about AI’s difficulties and its tendency to in tech jobs.

As for Nick, he’s a rising senior and still swears by the ChatGPT therapist in his pocket.

He calls his interactions with it both more reliable and honest than those he has with friends and family. If he called them in a pinch, they might not pick up. Even if they did, they might simply tell him what he wants to hear. 

Friends usually tell him they find the ChatGPT arrangement “a bit odd,” but he finds it pretty sensible. He has heard stories of people in Japan and thinks to himself, “Well, that’s a little strange.” He wouldn’t go that far, but acknowledges, “We’re already a bit like cyborgs as people, in the way that we depend on our phones.” 

Lately, he’s taken to using the AI’s voice mode. Instead of typing on a keyboard, he has real-time conversations with a variety of male- or female-voiced interlocutors, depending on his mood. And he gets a companion that has a deeper understanding of his dilemmas — at $20 per month, the advanced version remembers their past conversations and is “getting better at even knowing who I am and how I deal with things.” 

Sometimes talking with AI is just easier — even when he’s on vacation with friends.

Reached by phone recently at the beach with his girlfriend and a few other college pals, Nick admitted that he wasn’t having such a great time — he has a fraught recent history with some in the group, and had been texting ChatGPT about the possibility of just getting on a plane and going home. After hanging up from the interview, he said, he planned to ask the AI if he should stay or go.

Days later, Nick said he and the chatbot had talked. It suggested that maybe he felt “undervalued” and concerned about boundaries in his relationship with his girlfriend. He should talk openly with her, it suggested, even if he was, in his view, “honestly miserable” at the beach. It persuaded him to stick around and work it out. 

While his girlfriend knows about his ChatGPT shrink and they share an account, he deletes conversations about their real-life relationship.

She may never know the role AI played in keeping them together.

Keynote speakers this year include of Harlem Children’s Zone, of Stanford University, who popularized the idea of “growth mindset,” and actor , who starred on Broadway as George Washington in Hamilton. Jackson, who has a child on the autism spectrum, will discuss how doctors, parents and advocates are working together to change the ways neurodivergent kids communicate and learn.

But one issue that looms larger than most in the imaginations of educators is artificial intelligence. This year, South by Southwest EDU is offering dozens of sessions exploring AI’s potential and pitfalls. To help guide the way, we’ve scoured the schedule to highlight 18 of the most significant presenters, topics and panels: 

Monday, March 4:

: The New School’s Maya Georgieva looks at how AI is ushering in a new era of immersive experiences. Her talk explores worlds that blur the lines between the virtual and real, where human ingenuity converges with intelligent machines. Georgieva will spotlight the next generation of creators shaping immersive realities, sharing emerging practices and projects from her students as well as her innovation labs and design jams. .

: Educators have long sought a better way to demonstrate learning, adapt instruction and build student confidence. Now, advancements in machine learning, natural language processing and data analytics are creating new possibilities for finding out what students know. This session will explore the ways in which AI is rendering assessments invisible, reducing stress and anxiety for students while improving objectivity and generating actionable insights for educators. .

: Many high-pressure professions — pilots, doctors and professional athletes among others — have access to high-quality simulators to help them learn and improve their skills. Could teachers benefit from hours in a simulator before setting foot in a classroom? In this session featuring presenters from the Relay Graduate School of Education and Wharton Interactive at the University of Pennsylvania, panelists will discuss virtual classrooms they’re piloting. They’ll also address the challenges, successes and possibilities of developing an AI-driven teaching simulator. .

: In just the first half of 2023, venture capital investors poured more than $40 billion into AI startups. Yet big questions loom about how these technologies may impact education and the world of work. How are education and workforce investors separating wheat from chaff? Hear from a trio of venture capital and impact investors as they share the trends they’re watching. .

: This session will look at the profound transformations in teaching taking place in classrooms that blend AI with tailored, competency-focused education. Laura Jeanne Penrod of Southwest Career and Technical Academy and Nevada’s 2024 will explore AI’s role in enhancing rather than supplanting quality teaching — and what happens when schools embrace the human touch and educators’ emotional intelligence. .

: In this interactive workshop led by women leaders from the University of Texas at Austin and the Waco (Texas) Independent School District, participants will learn how to design effective lesson plans and syllabi that incorporate AI tools such as ChatGPT and DALL-E to help prepare students to address society’s most pressing needs. .

: If we get AI in education right, it has the power to revolutionize how children learn. But if we get it wrong and fail to nourish children’s creativity — their ability to innovate, think critically and problem solve — we risk leaving them unprepared for a changing world. Creativity is the durable skill that AI cannot replace. And this panel, comprising educators and industry leaders, will explore the role we play in nurturing children’s innate creativity. .

: This panel, featuring early AI-in-education pioneers such as Amanda Bickerstaff, founder of AI for Education, Charles Foster, an AI researcher at Finetune Learning, and Ben Kornell,  co-founder of Edtech Insiders, will explore their journeys and what they consider the most exciting future opportunities — and important challenges — in this emerging space. .

Tuesday, March 5:

: AI’s continued adoption in schools raises concerns about bias, especially toward students of color. This session, hosted by Common Sense Education’s Jamie Nunez, will highlight practical ways AI tools impact engagement for students from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds. It will also address ethical concerns such as plagiarism and issues with facial recognition tools. And it will feature positive student experiences with AI and practical ways to ensure it remains inclusive. .

: In 2024, what defines “AI literacy”? And how can we promote it effectively in schools? Marc Cicchino, innovation director for the Northern Valley Regional High School District in northeastern New Jersey, shares insights on fostering AI literacy through tailored learning experiences and initiatives like the NJ AI Literacy Summit. As part of the session, Cicchino guides attendees through organizing their own summit. . 

: Come watch a live recording of The Cusp, a new podcast hosted by Work Shift’s Paul Fain, exploring AI’s potential to not only enhance how we develop skills and improve job quality but exacerbate inequalities in our education and workforce systems. Leaders from Learning Collider, MDRC and Burning Glass Institute will share their perspectives on how AI can reach learners and workers in innovative ways, bridging the gap to economic opportunity. .

: While a few school districts have embraced artificial intelligence, neither the technology companies creating the AI nor the governments regulating it have provided guidance on how to integrate the new tech into classrooms. This has left districts wondering how to integrate AI safely, ethically and equitably. This panel of TeachAI.org founders and advisory members will discuss why government and education leaders must align standards with the needs of an increasingly AI-driven world. The panel features Khan Academy’s Kristen DiCerbo, Kara McWilliams of ETS, Code.org and ISTE’s Joseph South. .

Wednesday, March 6:

: Just as artificial intelligence is gaining momentum in education, the early childhood education workforce is experiencing record levels of burnout. A recent survey found many educators say they’re more likely to remain in their roles if they have access to better support, including high-quality classroom tools and flexible professional development. Could we harness AI to empower our early childhood workforce? This panel, led by the National Association for the Education of Young Children’s Stanford Accelerator for Learning, will explore the possibilities and challenges of AI in early childhood education. .

Perhaps no one in education needs to adapt more to AI than principals. This discussion with a principal and consultants from IDEO, The Leadership Academy and the Aspen Institute will explore how principals can lead during this time of swift change. Participants will come away with tangible suggestions for fostering innovation, adaptability and self-awareness. .

: This interactive session will give educators an opportunity to explore how they might use AI to advance their work, regardless of their background or technical expertise. ​Led by project managers and leadership development specialists with Teach For America, it will help participants create their own AI tools, build a deeper understanding of generative AI and develop a better sense of its promises and risks. .

Thursday, March 7: 

: This panel discussion, led by The Education Trust’s Dia Bryant and Khan Academy’s Kristen DiCerbo, will look at whether emerging uses of AI in schools could create a new digital divide. It will explore the intersection of AI and education equity and AI’s impact on students of color, as well as those from low-income backgrounds. The session will offer steps that educators and policymakers can take to ensure that schools factor in the culture and neurodiversity of students. . 

: This session, led by Alex Tsado of Alliance4ai, will explore what’s required to engage diverse learners to become emerging AI leaders. It’ll also explore how educators can help them build tech and leadership skills and promote an “AI-for-good” worldview. And it’ll examine the challenges that Black communities face in AI development — and propose research and solutions that can be scaled easily. .

: This panel brings together of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Educational Technology and Jeremy of Digital Promise for an interactive conversation about generative AI that will integrate two distinctive and powerful vantage points — policy and research. They’ll reflect on the listening sessions they’ve conducted, talk about policy and share insights from major research initiatives that address the efficacy, equity and ethics of generative AI. .

An important piece of ’s work focuses on improving the futures of Idaho youth, particularly those in rural communities. In a number of ways, AmeriCorps funding plays a key role in our programs.

Teach For America teachers are also AmeriCorps members. They can use Segal AmeriCorps Education Awards to pay for teacher certification or to pay down their existing student debt. Participation in AmeriCorps also enables them to defer their undergraduate loans for the first two years of teaching and have the interest, which accrues during those two years, paid off by the federal government.

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for The 74 Newsletter

These awards help us recruit a more socio-economically diverse teaching force, which helps boost student learning in underserved communities. If this significant benefit were to disappear, it would have a strongly negative impact on our recruiting efforts. Since launching in Idaho in 2015, Teach For America teachers have reached more than 30,000 Idaho students.

It has been Teach For America’s experience that many individuals who want to serve, particularly as educators, are unable to do so. They face significant economic barriers, including high student debt and the cost of teacher certification, which make it difficult to enter a lower-paying profession such as teaching.

It’s important that people understand that beyond the overwhelmingly positive impact Teach For America has on students, our AmeriCorps members also gain a great deal of knowledge and experience from working with us. They frequently turn that experience into careers.

Former Teach For America teachers now work in all echelons of our state’s education system. Some are teachers, others are principals or school board members. Their experience in Idaho classrooms, made possible in part by AmeriCorps, represents only the beginning of their contributions to education in our state.

Idaho’s congressmenRep. Russ Fulcher and Rep. Mike Simpson should know that Idahoans value the programming made possible by the presence of AmeriCorps in our state.

Reducing its footprint would harm the people who need its services most. It is truly a hidden gem in the Gem State.

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Idaho Capital Sun maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Christina Lords for questions: info@idahocapitalsun.com. Follow Idaho Capital Sun on and .