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Week in Edtech: Monica Arés on ChatGPT

Alex Sarlin

Jan 25, 2023

STORY

This week, we kick off with a stirring missive from Monica Arés, fresh off her experience as Head of Immersive Learning at Meta.

Monica’s podcast episode was the most popular episode of 2022, and her perspective on the future of AI in Edtech is valuable for everyone thinking about the future of the space.

“My inbox is flooded with articles about how Chat GPT is going to help students plagiarize, cheat, or result in catastrophic loss of writing skills. And I say, “BRING IT.” I am thrilled that this will force us to raise the level of the foundation from which we start instruction and open up class time for discussion, higher order thinking, debate and problem solving.
These new tools will push us to access and grow our brains in new ways, resulting in one of the most exciting evolutionary moments in education.
When my dad was little, he used a slide rule for calculations. It took him the entire class to find the answer. When I was little, I pushed a button on the calculator to find the same answer, freeing up the rest of class for real world applications and higher order thinking.
Chat GPT is just the calculator for writing.
It is a revolutionary tool that will push us to new spaces, ideas, and capabilities. Our job isn’t to stop it; it’s to work with it and delight in the new pathways for education that are opening up. This is innovation in action.
The transition will be messy and there will be pieces that disrupt and break, but the opportunity to build differently in a way that opens access and transforms learning is sitting right in front of us.
This moment belongs to the brave, to those who can see around the corner, and who want what happens in this moment to benefit generations to come. Let’s build this future together.”

BIG FIVE HEADLINES

The top stories this week from around the Edtech ecosystem:

1. ChatGPT Continues to Polarize:

Mixed emotions continue to reign as AI starts to enter the education conversation in earnest. In alignment with Ben and Alex’s podcast predictions about every founder needing an AI slide in their pitch deck, Forbes predicts that ChatGPT will create a new Edtech boom...
...while at the same time, schools and universities are panicking about academic integrity, leading to mass bans of both ChatGPT at large school districts (following a similarly fearful growth in bans on Tiktok at universities)

2. Big Tech Shakeups Continue:

We discuss the controversial layoffs at Google and Microsoft and whether it might breed new entrepreneurs in edtech or seek a rush to stability...
...and we discuss Reed Hasting's one-two punch of donating to Minerva University and then his surprise move of stepping down as Netflix CEO

3. XR/VR/AR in Education

Some bright spots for Immersive Education, despite possible divestiture from large tech companies who seem to be pivoting toward profitability
Prisms VR launches in the Meta Store
ASU-incubated Dreamscape Learn gets $20M in funding

4. 2023 Edtech Predictions from our friends at Transcend

The 2023 predictions from Transcend founders Alberto Arenaza and Michael Narea caught our attention, as they are some of the most thoughtful observers of the Edtech landscape

5. ASU, Crash Course and Google Launch Study Hall

In an Edtech all-star teamup for the ages, Arizona State University’s Michael Crow, author-influencer-educators John and Hank Green and the good folks at Youtube for Education have launched Study Hall, a tool to expand access to college guidance and even college credit for the next generations.