The title really should specify “to teach remotely”. And I think more broadly the context is the dream that widespread internet would make it easier to educate people “at scale” (meaning for less money per student).
So maybe the real question is why we ever expected “teaching at scale” to be effective.
I think that it’s quite clear that for an individual, curious student, the ability to use modern LLMs probably makes the ability to be 1-1 tutored (by a human!) cheaper/better. But I don’t think anyone claims that watching random videos on the internet will be as effective for LeBron James as having a personal trainer focused on him.
It seems like the overriding issue is to understand whether students need to take courses they’re not interested in. If the answer is yes, perhaps we need find ways of having these topics be taught by tutorial…
> They may view an instructor as an opponent standing in the way of the grade they want. And they see “getting the right answers” as the goal of education because that’s how you secure that grade. But that’s no more true than thinking that logging a count of reps is the goal of bodybuilding.
The author is essentially saying "you're doing education wrong" to students who never signed up for the author's version of what education is for. Students are making a rational economic calculation: they need a degree to get a job.
I see it as wanting to receive the credential (biology degree) while avoiding what it is supposed to signify (having learned something about biology.) But why would regular companies want graduates in English Literature, or History? Graduates should still be able to read, think critically, and write clearly - and the way you learn to do that is by actually doing the assignments.
Of course a more cynical view is that much of formal education is just teaching compliance (which employers also value), but college usually grants more non-financial freedom than a typical corporate workplace.
In any case, I guess it's good that you can't use ChatGPT to pass driving tests or medical licensing exams. Yet.
How reductive. Sure, there are paper mills and non-reputable colleges that hand out degrees, but that's clearly not what the author is writing about ('lecturers' there won't care about students cheating anyway).
So with that, what student expects college to be an easy pass to a job? College has always involved work, not a coupon for a free job.
> students who never signed up for the author's version of what education is
What? That's what college is. Students sign up to be taught however the college wants to teach. Students can choose to apply to colleges that match their style, but that hasn't changed at all.
I'm curious what you think students expect when they enroll in a reputable college
I'm in an online course right now (teachers college) that requires weekly discussions. I feel like every discussion is just AI responding to AI. As a student I think it's lame, I'm sure the profs do too. I'm not totally against AI usage as it is incredibly helpful with spelling and grammar, what I hate is reading meaningless, vague and uninteresting discussion posts week after week. There is nothing personal or interesting about anything anyone posts because its all done by AI.
ChatGPT is a great resource for learning things, if you really want to learn.
I hope that this leads us to shift education towards helping people learn things, when they do want to learn. Instead of forcing people to learn things that they do not want to learn.
> For the last few years, I’ve been exclusively teaching asynchronous online courses, meaning recorded videos rather than live sessions
This seems like the root issue. In the ChatGPT era, remote student assessments cannot (remotely) be trusted. Since you cannot trust the assessment, it should probably be optional, and not used for credentialing purposes.
Grading systems in school are and have always been broken, ChatGPT is only making these issues more apparent. Students are great "reward hackers" and are incentivized to find the most efficient solution to getting good grades regardless of whether they're actually learning. Learning takes a back seat to getting good grades.
There's a reason you're only hearing this from schools and not companies. I haven't seen any corporate execs complaining that they don't know who their good and bad employees are because of AI.
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[ 0.20 ms ] story [ 29.9 ms ] threadSo maybe the real question is why we ever expected “teaching at scale” to be effective.
I think that it’s quite clear that for an individual, curious student, the ability to use modern LLMs probably makes the ability to be 1-1 tutored (by a human!) cheaper/better. But I don’t think anyone claims that watching random videos on the internet will be as effective for LeBron James as having a personal trainer focused on him.
It seems like the overriding issue is to understand whether students need to take courses they’re not interested in. If the answer is yes, perhaps we need find ways of having these topics be taught by tutorial…
The author is essentially saying "you're doing education wrong" to students who never signed up for the author's version of what education is for. Students are making a rational economic calculation: they need a degree to get a job.
I see it as wanting to receive the credential (biology degree) while avoiding what it is supposed to signify (having learned something about biology.) But why would regular companies want graduates in English Literature, or History? Graduates should still be able to read, think critically, and write clearly - and the way you learn to do that is by actually doing the assignments.
Of course a more cynical view is that much of formal education is just teaching compliance (which employers also value), but college usually grants more non-financial freedom than a typical corporate workplace.
In any case, I guess it's good that you can't use ChatGPT to pass driving tests or medical licensing exams. Yet.
So with that, what student expects college to be an easy pass to a job? College has always involved work, not a coupon for a free job.
> students who never signed up for the author's version of what education is
What? That's what college is. Students sign up to be taught however the college wants to teach. Students can choose to apply to colleges that match their style, but that hasn't changed at all.
I'm curious what you think students expect when they enroll in a reputable college
I hope that this leads us to shift education towards helping people learn things, when they do want to learn. Instead of forcing people to learn things that they do not want to learn.
This seems like the root issue. In the ChatGPT era, remote student assessments cannot (remotely) be trusted. Since you cannot trust the assessment, it should probably be optional, and not used for credentialing purposes.
There's a reason you're only hearing this from schools and not companies. I haven't seen any corporate execs complaining that they don't know who their good and bad employees are because of AI.