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Alexander Russo's The Grade
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Taking a Closer Look at Education News alexanderrusso.substack.com

  1. 14h ago

    How tech took over

    After years of feeling like she was a lone voice in the wilderness, journalist Audrey Watters says she suddenly doesn’t feel alone in raising concerns about technology in schools (and other aspects of technology). In this new interview, Watters describes how schools became so tech-infused even before the pandemic, why she stepped away from reporting on edtech during the pandemic, and what it’s like to be back on the story during such a tumultuous time. Watch the interview or read the transcript above (or on YouTube). Listen to the conversation on Spotify or Apple. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit alexanderrusso.substack.com/subscribe

    How tech took over

  2. 5d ago

    Skepticism — & nuance — needed in edtech coverage

    I’ve wanted to talk with The 74’s Greg Toppo ever since the backlash against education technology started a few months ago. A veteran reporter and book author (as well as a longtime friend), Toppo has written frequently about new technology being used in schools — and he’s the author of an important 2015 book about games and learning. And in this new interview, Toppo doesn’t disappoint, sharing his views on where the backlash has come from (parents’ desire for a sense of control) and how the conversation surrounding tech sometimes makes him nervous. “When the coverage makes me nervous it’s the reporter not asking the kinds of questions that I would want to ask,” says Toppo. “Like I thought that Wall Street Journal piece about YouTube was amazing…[But] what else is happening that creates an opening? What is the thing that happened to make that happen?” Reflecting on media coverage, Toppo’s view is that journalists have — finally — become adequately skeptical of edtech hype. “I think we as an industry have absorbed Audrey Watters’ lessons,” he says. “I would in large part put myself in the group of people who didn’t really absorb that message very well. But I think I think now people have.” Watch the interview or read the transcript above (or on YouTube). Listen to the conversation on Spotify or Apple. You can follow Greg at @gtoppo, read his stories here, and find his book here. Key quotes: “It feels like we are experiencing a kind of a culmination of the past at the least six years at most, maybe 10 or 15 years of parent anxiety about technology.” “I think obviously the pandemic had a lot to do with it, putting devices in kids’ hands and that didn’t go very well. So there’s I think there’s a sense that a lot of parents have that you know they’re now kind of returning to schools and seeing, ‘Wait a minute, the devices are still here. I thought they were gonna disappear after 2022.’ I think there’s that shock of realization that kids are spending a lot of time on devices.” “The Jon Haidt ‘cellphones out of schools’ campaign showed the way, right? It showed that if you get enough parents very mad about a very specific, very kind of clear thing, that they can really make some headway. And so I think a lot of parents saw what was possible with that.” “I think that word ‘control’ is a big deal that we don’t talk about. Parents want control and I think they feel like they don’t have it — and they want to get it back.” “My sense is that every place is different, and I think we are just hearing from the worst. We’re hearing from the places where it’s where the tech is just, you know, to the roof. When you read these parents’ testimony and their interviews and their pleas, I mean, they really sound quite like grounded and reasonable and in a lot of ways, you know, they’re really like desperate pleas for people to do something different. I don’t think we can argue at that.” “Every story I’ve ever read about this problem over the past year has the same anecdote, right? A parent realizes their kid watched something in school and is just blown away by the fact that, you know, Tuesday afternoon from one to three, they were watching some movie instead of attending to their schoolwork.” “To me the the bigger question though is like what is happening in that school to that kid so that that kid has uninterrupted time to watch an entire movie with no ramifications? Where’s all this free time coming from?” “I spent a lot of time like thinking about tech like more broadly and thinking about kind of how we as adults, like every generation, has this kind of weird relationship to tech — not just educational technology, but just tech in general.” “I think a lot of the stuff that’s in kids’ schools is not gamification. It’s just a word people are hearing. There’s a difference between gamification and game based learning. And I think probably there’s some gamification, I’m gonna guess, but a lot of it is not gamification. A lot of it is actually game-based learning that’s sometimes really good, really effective.” “When you get the internet, you get it all. Right? It’s a package deal. So you get, you know, you you get either get i-Ready, you get curriculum, but you also get Netflix and YouTube. You can’t separate these things out. I think that’s a really important thing in terms of the anxiety that parents are feeling to put that to put that context — that there’s a lot of nervousness about just the all-you-can-eat buffet of it.” “I feel like sometimes the the fact that it’s all consolidated into this concern about tech and this campaign to to lower the level of tech, to me that feels like maybe it’s a little misplaced.” “When the coverage makes me nervous it’s the reporter not asking the kinds of questions that I would want to ask. Like I thought that Wall Street Journal piece about YouTube was amazing. I thought the data on that was just like just jaw-dropping. But I also wanna go to a different place with it, which is like kind of the question I had before, which is like, ‘What else is happening that creates an opening?’ Like we we get the results. ‘What is the thing that happened to make that happen?’” “I think there’s a lot of cool stuff out there,” says Toppo. “One of the things that was so fascinating to me about writing about that world was that there were a lot of people who cared a ton who were trying to do something different and weird and and really succeeded in my estimation and continue to succeed.” “If you ask the people who make the cool creative stuff, they would say they don’t have the marketing or the lobbying power that the big guys do. They can’t go to state capitals during the legislative session and lobby the lawmakers to make their tool the only one that kids can use or the or get it onto the state list of approved curriculums.” “The hype cycle is fast these days. I feel like people write about something like for instance, like Alpha School. To me, almost as soon as we got gleaming stories about how amazing this was, we got stories of what a hellscape it was. And they were sometimes happening like the same week.” “I think we as an industry have absorbed Audrey Watters’ lessons. You know, years and years ago she was just kind of screaming from the rooftops ‘This s**t isn’t as all it’s said to be. These companies are not looking out for your kids’ best interests. There’s a dark side to all this.’” “I would in large part put myself in the group of people who didn’t really absorb that message very well. But I think I think now people have for for a number of reasons, number one being her just absolute persistence and kind of amazing ability to bring all these strings together. But also I think Silicon Valley’s kind of reached its Sell By date for a lot of people.” “I think if I wrote [my book] in 2026, I think it would be a slightly different book. I think we know more about how kids learn. I think I know more about a little bit of everything, and I’m a little more skeptical. I mean, I was skeptical going into it, but the way my skepticism expressed itself was I almost entirely wrote about tiny little efforts, like small studios.” “I think it’s gonna change in some places. I don’t think it’s gonna change more broadly. I don’t think we’re gonna see like lots and lots of school districts, you know, with memos in the fall saying, ‘No more Chromebooks. No more iPads.’ I think there’s still gonna be a lot of that.” “I’m gonna predict that people are on the ground are gonna be more focused on the money being spent. How is the money being spent? If anything, this has been an exercise in kind of opening opening up the process to a lot of people, opening up the books. ‘How much are we spending on iReady? How much are we spending on iPads?’ I think once that sort of revelation passes, I think maybe it’ll be a little more like data centric.” Previously from The Grade Immunizing schools from bad edtech (with Amplify’s Dan Meyer) Covering Edtech Like Big Pharma (with the NYT’s Natasha Singer) The case for i-Ready (with Curriculum Associates’ Ty Holmes) Why so many parents hate AI right now (with NYT opinion writer Jessica Grose) How one reporter latched onto the edtech backlash (with NBC’s Tyler Kingkade) In defense of education technology (with former EdSurge editor Tony Wan) Why are schools awash in YouTube? (with the WSJ’s Shalini Ramachandran) Education, technology, & the media (roundup of previous coverage) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit alexanderrusso.substack.com/subscribe

    Skepticism — & nuance — needed in edtech coverage

  3. Aug 14

    Sources, scoops, & soaring audience

    A few years ago now, Jenny Abamu left the education beat — and journalism — for what she thought was going to be forever. On her way out the door, she gave The Grade a frank interview about her experiences on the job — an illustration of her insight and candor that remains valuable to this day. Eventually, Abamu returned to journalism — this time as a politics and government reporter — and last year she launched a TikTok to supplement her coverage and published a piece about why she was making the move. A year later, Abamu is back to talk about the challenges and — mostly — successes that she’s experienced making vertical videos as part of her coverage. She’s got nearly 14,000 followers on TikTok, and her most popular videos have generated tens of thousands of views. Watch the interview or read the transcript above (or on YouTube). Listen to the conversation on Spotify or Apple. Among the many lessons that Abamu shared from her experience: People want to know what you’ve found out; they just don’t want to have to look elsewhere for it. Daily or near-daily videos help build momentum and community. Vertical video helps win readers and generate new sources and story ideas. Ninety seconds is a good length for vertical video — not too long, not too short. Original stories work a lot better than roundups. Writing a script takes time — but it also can save time (and prevent mistakes). Putting something out on social media can help generate tips, sources, and inform the final product. Set a time limit for working on each video or you’ll edit it all night. Don’t worry about being scooped; it doesn’t happen (or matter) as much as you may think. Be prepared to be recognized in public, and maybe even hugged? Don’t start with fancy equipment or try to make too many edits. It’s OK — or even good — to be doing something else (cooking, walking to the car) while you’re talking to your audience. People want to feel like they know you through your videos. Think about vertical video as telling a story to an interested friend, not the anonymous masses. If you want to get fancy, pull in a screenshot of the story you’re talking about — or a meme you find relevant and amusing. The first few seconds of your video are the hook that determines whether folks stay or keep scrolling, so pay attention like you would to a good headline. The initial awkwardness of recording yourself on camera can turn into a kind of intimacy with your audience. Your videos will generate sources, tidbits, and scoops. Previously from The Grade Why I finally joined TikTok (and you probably should, too) Star reporter Jenny Abamu explains why she left journalism — and ways to fix education news Mandy McLaren, the education beat’s TikTok star This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit alexanderrusso.substack.com/subscribe

    Sources, scoops, & soaring audience

  4. Aug 12

    American schools are fine, says Freddie deBoer

    The first thing you need to know about Freddie deBoer, the enfant terrible of Substack, is that he’s actually quite friendly in person — or at least he was to me when I had the chance to interview him. If deBoer’s name sounds familiar, there’s a reason for that. He’s got a very popular Substack. He is eloquent and vulnerable on many topics, including mental health and masculinity. He is frequently and fascinatingly wrong on education, at least according to me. He once took great exception to a piece I’d asked him to write then killed. Watch above or on YouTube. Listen on Spotify or Apple. The occasion for our late-June conversation was No, American schools aren’t failing, deBoer’s recent Boston Globe oped arguing that schools are generally doing much better than we think they are — with the exception of communities that are so marginalized that improving schools will not alone do much to help. “Educational outcomes are dominantly the product of on the group level, socioeconomic and cultural factors that schools and teachers can’t control — and on the individual level, individual talent differences between individual students that schools and teachers can’t control.” On the topic of media coverage, deBoer’s main complaint is what he describes as liberal incoherence about what schools are supposed to accomplish. “The New York Times is not what I would call a staunchly anti-union or or pro-firing sort of place, but they exemplify a certain kind of incoherence,” says deBoer. ‘The Times will talk about like ‘better’ or ‘worse’ schools, but sometimes they think that the best students should go to the best schools, and sometimes the worst students should go to the worst schools.” You can subscribe to Freddie’s Substack here. You can read about his forthcoming book here. Previously from The Grade Journalism should help debunk the education myth it created (Jim Shelton) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit alexanderrusso.substack.com/subscribe

    American schools are fine, says Freddie deBoer

  5. Aug 7

    Charlie Barone: The school reform nobody sees

    The conventional wisdom is that school reform has been dead for about a decade now, for better or worse. But the National Parents Union’s Charlie Barone has a different take, which is that a lot of different things are happen even if they aren’t national and bipartisan. That being said, NPU has just launched an effort to pass a national literacy law, beginning with the bipartisan introduction of a new bill. Watch the interview or read the transcript above (or on YouTube). Listen to the conversation on Spotify or Apple. KEY QUOTES “In the past we’ve gone through periods where there are very predominant policy initiatives going on that are nationwide — that everybody’s debating. This isn’t so much one of those times.” But that doesn’t mean reform isn’t happening — far from it. “There’s a lot of different things going on in different places and not one national zeitgeist. You have in the red states a big push toward choice right now…Another national conversation we’re having that isn’t happening everywhere, but is happening a lot of different places is literacy.” Unlike others, Barone takes a broad view of what constitutes “reform” that includes literacy, choice, and edtech. “I would put in the category of ed reform anything that’s asking people to do something differently than they’re doing now… I always think of reform in terms of give some resources but ask them to do something in return. And that would be my definition of reform. Because almost anything that you ask people to do differently than they’re doing now, you’re going to get resistance.” Based on his own personal experience, Barone gets the sense that tech makes teachers sit back. “I have two kids that are in a public middle school, they’re rising eighth graders, and I do see it in their classrooms. I can tell you from personal experience, there’s a little bit of hangover in their classrooms where there’s a tendency for teachers to wanna give them an assignment at the beginning of the class and then have them work independently at their desks on their Chromebook and complete assignments. And then the teacher just sort of sits back… But then like, what’s the teacher’s role, right?” On the issue of reform, Barone and I agree that the old days aren’t coming back — and that’s a good thing. “I mean on the NCLB question, there is some nostalgia. I think that’s in large part driven when people look back at the data and see a drop off in student achievement beginning around 2013. And that was right after the Obama administration began backing off of accountability and offering offering state waivers… But you know, we’ve learned some things since then.” “What we are seeing working in in some states is addressing capacity and resources tied to some evidence-based policy — particularly around reading and somewhat in math, where it’s basically a tiered system of support. So unlike ESSA, you’re not waiting for schools to fail. You’re saying on a statewide basis, here is Tier One, what we think every school should have access to: high-quality instructional materials, reading coaches, those kinds of things. And then you drill down to to Tiers Two and Three that’s more specialized, where you’re providing extra resources to either schools that are lagging or to students that are lagging, things like high impact tutoring. And so I think we can return to a time where we could see nationwide improvements in student achievement, but I don’t think the way to get there is to go back to NCLB.” “And look, other things are important than student achievement. NCLB was all about student achievement. It was great that we refocused the system on that, but you’ve gotta incentivize other types of outcomes for schools and students.” Asked if the time for a big push is now, Barone demures. “I don’t think we’re at that moment. I think the obstacles are on the right, this push toward choice and this idea that choice solves all your accountability problems.” A few red states have decided not to put all their eggs in the private school choice basket, says Barone — Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee — but others are all in on choice. “On the left, I think the primary obstacle is Democrats don’t have permission from the education establishment to talk about outcomes. They are discouraged from talking about outcomes. If you want to improve outcomes, the first thing you gotta do is start talking honestly about where you are. You know, I still watch a lot of hearings in Congress. I will tell you like Democrats have a really hard time bringing up outcomes because they’re discouraged from doing it because it’s seen as bad-mouthing the current system, and the current system is already under attack. So why do you want to further attack the system with you know negative talk about outcomes when it’s already under attack? That’s a recipe for things never getting any better.” “I have seen that change though, and I think what’s happening with reading is helping change this dynamic. Just over the last six months in watching hearings, I’ve seen more Democrats willing to talk about reading outcomes… My impression is that there’s a higher comfort level because just the level of awareness that’s been raised around student literacy is making it more comfortable for Democrats to bring this up. Now you gotta do something about it, right? Eventually. I think that’s the first step, and I see some progress on that first step being made these days.” “I think one of the things that’s made doing accountability hard is people feel like they’re being blamed or shamed because of the low student outcomes, and it makes them defensive and they feel like they’re working hard — and in most cases they are working hard, right?” “Back when I worked on the Hill for Congressman George Miller, we tried to push teacher prep reform — which I know you did with your boss, Jeff Bingaman — and we worked together on some of those things. And you know, one of Miller’s primary talking points were that students in schools of education were being short-changed. They were being cheated, sold a bill of goods that if they completed these programs, they’d be prepared to teach in a classroom. And then when they arrived in a classroom, most of them will tell you they weren’t. They weren’t taught how to teach reading. They weren’t taught how to manage a classroom. They weren’t taught how to develop a curriculum and a syllabus and those kinds of things. So I think that’s a big part of it.” “I think the coverage overall is pretty good. I I think a lot of people on the national beat are getting the story right. They’re asking the right questions… Sometimes the coverage though is a little simplistic. I brought this up at the EWA, where I feel like the the role of civil rights and disability groups in accountability is being underreported. You know, they they played a big role on ESSA in 2015. I’m not saying ESSA is the pinnacle of accountability, but the fact that ESSA has any accountability at all is largely due to civil rights and disability groups. And I don’t feel that was well covered.” This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit alexanderrusso.substack.com/subscribe

    Charlie Barone: The school reform nobody sees

  6. Aug 5

    Covering edtech like Big Pharma

    Perhaps no other journalist is closer to the center of the current reckoning over education technology than the New York Times’ Natasha Singer, the technology reporter who’s been covering edtech for years now and has a new book coming out next month on the topic. You may recall some of her recent work on schools that have put Chromebooks back in carts and parents’ successful efforts to rein in edtech, as well as her recent appearance on The Daily podcast to talk about the perils and promise of AI in schools. In this new interview, Singer — who officially writes for the business section of the Times — describes how technology companies make schools feel like their kids are going to be left behind if they don’t have the latest gadget or app — often without much hard evidence of effectiveness. “It feels like collective amnesia to me that each time there’s a new big tech hype cycle in school, we have to get the latest tool into the classroom,” says Singer. “I think journalists also have collective amnesia sometimes.” Watch the interview or read the transcript above (or on YouTube). Listen to the conversation on Spotify or Apple. As you’ll see, Singer compares covering edtech to covering medical device companies selling products to doctors and hospitals. And she urges everyone to think carefully about the language and the messages that the tech companies are using — which is often full of presumptions and speculation. It’s clear to Singer that many parents have become extremely concerned about the manner and extent of edtech adoption. “The scale at which parents are now voicing their concerns and reaching out to their school boards and their principals and their legislators and to journalists like me and many others, I’ve never seen this response on this kind of scale before.” But at the same time, Singer calls on skeptical parents and others to focus on benefits to kids, not simplistic metrics like screentime. She reminds us that districts and school vary enormously in how much tech kids are getting. And she thinks that some edtech is promising. You can follow Singer on Twitter/X @natashanyt. Her new book “CODING KIDS: Big Tech’s Battle to Remake Public Schools” is coming out in September. Her NYT stories appear here. Previously from The Grade How edtech lost its inevitability Education reporting in the age of AI (with Omidyar Fellow Lee Gaines) We’ve ‘lost the plot’ on edtech (with tech reporter Taylor Lorenz) The case for i-Ready (with Ty Holmes) Why so many parents hate AI right now (with NYT opinion writer Jessica Grose) How one reporter latched onto the edtech backlash (with NBC’s Tyler Kingkade) In defense of education technology (with former EdSurge editor Tony Wan) Why are schools awash in YouTube? (with the WSJ’s Shalini Ramachandran) Education, technology, & the media (roundup of previous coverage) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit alexanderrusso.substack.com/subscribe

    Covering edtech like Big Pharma

  7. Jul 22

    We've 'lost the plot' on edtech, says tech reporter Taylor Lorenz

    Device bans, screentime restrictions, and age limits for social media are deeply misguided attempts to address intrusive and ineffective tech, says User Mag’s Taylor Lorenz in this new interview. “How it’s being discussed is pretty bad, I would say,” she says about the current backlash. “I think we’ve lost the plot on so many issues.” “We need to take back control — and that means passing comprehensive federal data privacy regulation — really cracking down on big tech’s business model,” says Lorenz. “But a lot of people are just falling for this tech propaganda,” by which she means screentime limits, device bans, and age screening. Watch the interview or read the transcript above (or on YouTube). Listen to the conversation on Spotify or Apple. Key quotes “I think we’ve lost the plot on so many issues. It’s really frustrating.” “I think it’s a topic that inspires a lot of emotion. And so I think sometimes it’s hard to talk about.” “I think there can be a place for technology. I just think we also have a lot of bad actors in this.” “It’s just a lot of actors, a lot of different incentives at play. And I think anytime you’re talking about sort of technology that affects children, emotions are running high.” “The people that are usually worth listening to are the ones without the big social media presence, without the the newsletter that they’re trying to sell… "You kind of want to find not not the loudest voices in the room, which makes makes things harder, of course.” “I’ve reported extensively on technology bans. I’ve written even about the pager bans back in the nineties, which these laws are modeled on. We know what happened. “We know what happened with the beeper bans: it led to kids of color being targeted, hundreds of kids ending up with criminal records because they were actually arrested for having beepers on school campuses.” “I was talking to a mom in Los Angeles recently whose child goes to a sort of more urban school here, and a lot of the kids do shift work, a lot of the parents do shift work and not being able to communicate has been a complete disaster. These kids are missing shifts, their parents are missing shifts, it’s caused a lot of problems. And so I think we just have to find, you know, more tailored solutions. “Cell phones exist in the world. So we can’t go back to the nineties, right? Cell phones exist and they’re integrated into our world. And so I think we need to find smart ways to ensure that low-income students are not missing shift work, that they can check a message if their parents are gonna pick them up at a different time without having the them sort of able to sit and scroll all day during class.” “These companies profit off harvesting our data. They want to harvest data on children… These companies, they are tracking your children from the time they are in your womb — I am not kidding. They are building data profiles on your children, and that data will be used against you, your family, against your child.” “If you think your kids are addicted, quote unquote, to social media, that is because these companies have been harvesting massive and massive amounts of data to hyper-target them with the most engaging content.” “I think it’s even worse than the recycling example. It would be like if we were saying, ‘Hey, recycling is really bad. So now we’re actually mandating that in order to drink water, you have to purchase it in disposable plastic bottles’.” “These are always far-right policies that actually groups like the Heritage Foundation or Morality and Media, now known as as ENCOS, have been trying to push since the internet began. But only in the past few years have liberals got on board, primarily through Heritage Foundation collaborator Jonathan Haidt, who has said very horrible things about LGBTQ people but has been able to position himself in liberal circles and has gotten liberals on board with these policies that I would argue are sort of antithetical to democracy. I mean, Western leaders were very against this stuff until recently. and now I think they’ve, yeah, gotten on board. “They give a lot of self-interested answers and a lot of them have not been able to point to benefits. You know, are are there benefits to their technology? I think a lot of it we’re seeing probably maybe no.” Previously from The Grade Education, technology, and the media This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit alexanderrusso.substack.com/subscribe

    We've 'lost the plot' on edtech, says tech reporter Taylor Lorenz

  8. Jul 14

    Education reporting in the age of AI

    What a pleasure it was to speak with Lee Gaines, who’s emerged as an essential national journalist on schools and AI and the larger reconsideration of edtech. An education reporter for almost a decade now, Gaines started out as a newspaper reporter and then worked for Illinois Public Radio covering prison education and then the pandemic response and special education as a member of the staff at WFYI Indiana public media. Most recently, from her perch as an Omidyar Network reporter in residence, Gaines has been able to produce a string of stories on AI in schools that have been published by NPR as a series called Learning in the age of AI. Of all the journalists I’ve spoken to recently, Gaines may be the most doggedly even-handed. In this new interview, she describes the immense value AI can provide to engaged students, the role journalists’ antipathy towards AI has played in the current backlash, mixed feelings about at least one of the stories that she’s produced, and her own use of AI to assist her reporting. “If you are interested in covering ed tech and if you are interested in covering AI, I think you have a responsibility to familiarize yourself with those tools,” says Gaines — a familiarity that might also help journalists maintain an open mind. Technical difficulties prevent us from showing you the video interview in full, but we are going to clip as much as possible (below) and you can listen to the full audio or read the transcript (above) . Key quotes & clips from Gaines: Above: “My take on AI in schools from the student perspective is that if you are one of those kids that is intrinsically motivated to learn — you love learning for learning’s sake — I think you might be able to use AI in a way that enhances your learning. But if you are not one of those students, you are not intrinsically motivated — you’re just there to get the grade, the degree, to get out — I think AI can be really harmful.” “We’ve struggled for decades to figure out how to motivate the kids that aren’t already motivated to learn. And I think that AI is just exacerbating that and making that a more complex problem, because previously it was pretty evident that these kids were struggling or weren’t learning anything. And I think AI can kind of mask that.” “Education is this gigantic beat. And my philosophy for how to approach journalism is to find something that you’re passionate about and really focus and become the expert on that.” “I’m very interested in the human impact above all… I’m interested in the kid at the alternative school who’s using AI to get through the day. I’m interested in that high-performing student who’s using AI to apply for college or something. [I’m also interested] in the teachers that are struggling on a day-to-day basis, maybe who are trying to figure out like, ‘Is this my student’s work? Is this someone else? Is this AI’s work?’ And also the what the school districts are thinking, doing, and spending on AI… The human stories in all of this is what really guides my reporting. “The peril and the promise exist simultaneously.” “I feel like I saw [the backlash] coming in the cellphone bans. There is a connection between what’s going on with cellphones, to social media, to AI. Like all of this feels somewhat interrelated to me.” Above: “I have a lot of friends who are journalists who don’t cover AI and they are extremely anti-AI. Like, there’s a lot of people in like my personal life that are very anti-AI. And so to me, that was kind of the writing on the wall. The ed tech backlash is part of, I think, a larger cultural phenomenon, which is sort of like a tech backlash in general.” “The tech companies have partly done this to themselves. They’ve been very explicit about their intentions to have this technology replace all of our labor.” “I’ve been trying to use TikTok more, trying to do more direct-to-camera takes on my reporting. And I get really good engagement, despite not having any followers.” Above: “One thing I have noticed in the comments is that a lot of teachers — a lot of professors — they are overwhelmingly negative about AI. I take that very seriously. I think there are a lot of negatives that come along with the ungoverned Wild West version of this technology that we are currently experiencing. But I also wonder if they are they drowning out the more nuanced opinions?” “It’s hard in general as a journalist, and as a human being, to hold multiple truths at once. And I think the job of a journalist is to hold multiple truths at once. So what I’m trying to navigate is being very very open-minded to everyone’s perspective.” “There are teachers out there that are using this technology and finding utility in it. There are students out there that are using this technology, and it’s sort of up for debate whether or not that’s going to harm or help them. And I think it’s really dependent on the student themselves. So keeping an open mind and also a healthy dose of skepticism and critically approaching everything that I cover is what I try to do. I think that there are a lot of people that might be afraid to say that they’re using this technology because they don’t want to be judged by their peers.” “Teachers are using AI on their own for administrative work, for lesson planning, much more than they’re using AI with their students. They’re not bringing chatbots into the classroom very often — at least according to the survey that we did.” Above: “I actually have a little bit of weird feelings around the something that I did. So the Center for Democracy and Technology came out with this survey. They came out with a report that said like one in five high school aged kids either are in a relationship with AI or know someone who’s in a relationship with AI… We did a story about this survey and I went out after we did this story — I’ve made it a point every time I’m interviewing high-school aged kids now to basically ask them ‘Do you know anyone that’s in a relationship with AI?’ and I also ask teachers this, too, like ‘Do you know any students that are in a relationship with AI?’ and the reaction I get is laughter.” “A tool that I really like using is Notebook LM from Google. I highly recommend experimenting with that as a way to organize your sources and ask questions of your sources. I also think some of the deep research functions on the paid versions of Claude and ChatGPT are worth looking into. There are things that you can surface with those tools that you can’t — like documents that you might not be able to surface — without them. And I also just believe very strongly if you are interested in covering ed tech and if you are interested in covering AI, I think you have a responsibility to familiarize yourself with those tools.” “I was very interested in what schools are spending on AI detection software because AI we did a story about AI detection software not being reliable. And I was able to ask, I use Chat GPT’s Deep Research. I had to have the paid version to access this. I said, can you surface contracts between US-based public K-12 districts and these specific companies. And it was it went — without me even telling it to do this — it went into BoardDocs, which if people aren’t familiar, that’s the repository for for school board agendas and associated documentation, and it found a contract between Broward County Schools in Florida and Turnitin, which previously was famous for plagiarism software, but they’ve now gone into AI detection. It was a contract worth half a million dollars. Would I have found that without Deep Research? Maybe, but it certainly would have taken a lot more time to do that.” “I’ll never allow AI to write for me because I think that’s a betrayal of my my responsibility to the audience, but also that’s the part of the job that I like… That’s the part of the job that must stay human. That is the part of the job that is creative, that requires my judgment — that that only I feel like I can do, and I wanna keep it that way.” This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit alexanderrusso.substack.com/subscribe

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About

Taking a Closer Look at Education News alexanderrusso.substack.com

Information

  • Creator
    Alexander Russo's The Grade
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    62
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Alexander Russo
  • Show Website
    The Education Show

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