We Are Teaching Humans
A 50,000-foot view as we enter a new academic year
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As we prepare to go back to school, what to do about AI remains the big question for educators in 2025. The cool thing (at least according to my LinkedIn feed) is to focus on how to use the tools themselves and help students use them productively. I'm not opposed to this, per se, but I think it's a mistake for most of us.
Before we think about using AI for anything in our classes, we should use it as an opportunity to reexamine and repair the foundation. Before we add another floor to the top of our building, let's check to make sure the foundation doesn't have any cracks.
The foundation is human
As we think about the foundation, there is one big idea that we should keep in mind: education is a human endeavor. In a moment where parents, teachers, and students are all searching for something stable to hold onto, we need to pull up and try to get the 50,000-foot perspective. We need to remind ourselves of the things that education is really about:
Not just information, but wisdom
Not just skills, but character
Not just economic potential, but whole-person flourishing
Not just personalized learning, but relationship
Not just what we produce, but the process that forms us along the way
Education is not at its core about helping you memorize a bunch of information or build expertise. It's about giving you the tools to understand why that knowledge is valuable and to what end those skills should be applied. It's not that the information and skills are worthless; it's just that they're only a small piece of the puzzle.
This is why AI will only ever be at best a part of education and learning. These questions about wisdom, character, and flourishing are deeply human questions. They're the kind of questions that require you to be in relationship with other humans, not just with the stochastic regurgitations of their artifacts.
These deeply human questions are the reason we must design our education systems to recognize and respect the humanity of the people who are part of it. Our humanity means that we are limited, embodied, and error-prone. It means that we need sleep, food, and rest from our work. We are not data centers. We need more than electricity to power us and water to keep us cool. We have bodies that must be attended to and all too often fail us in one way or another. We are not just intellectual creatures, but emotional and spiritual ones as well; creatures guided not only by rational and logical decisions but by our desires and loves.
The ever-quickening pace of AI development means that if you’re working with students this fall, you probably need to talk about it in your classes this fall, if only to articulate why you're forbidding its use. But whatever your approach to AI, the only successful route will be one with a deeply human rationale. One that is not just about why (perhaps) AI may be important in your future career or why (perhaps) AI may cheat you of the very thing you are trying to learn. To be effective, arguments either for or against must be rooted in your values and learning goals.
The opportunity afforded by our current moment is double-edged. On the one hand, it encourages us to be curious and think about what lies ahead. On the other hand, it provides us with an opening to reexamine the foundations of everything we are doing. A chance to remind ourselves and our students about the real reasons that learning is worthwhile.
Got a thought? Leave a comment below.
Reading Recommendations
This podcast from James M. Lang and Dr. Tricia Bertram Gallant is a must-listen for thinking about AI in your classes this fall. Their conversation is full of the kind of human-centered teaching practices that will offer us a sustainable path forward in this moment. I love their tagline: trusting students to be human and and helping them to be their best selves.
In a world where conversations about academic integrity are often framed as us vs. them, this conversation is a clear reminder that it need not be.
David Perell’s latest blog post “Learn Like an Athlete” suggests that we take a more disciplined approach to our learning. Ideas worth considering as we approach the start of school. Doubly endorse this suggestion to show your work.
If you can publish your findings along the way, even better. Sharing your work is the best way to speed up your feedback loops, which will help you learn faster and improve your plan based on the feedback you receive.
Sharp analysis from Brad DeLong on Apple’s AI strategy. The tl;dr is that the bet is on inference on the edge for privacy, leveraging Apple’s killer hardware and device chops. The strategy may be good, but ya gotta execute…
The Book Nook
Continuing on a C. S. Lewis kick this week with his essay “Learning in War-time” which is the second chapter in The Weight of Glory. A reminder of the value of learning and educatation even, and perhaps especially, in trying times.
Human life has always been lived on the edge of a precipice. Human culture has always had to exist under the shadow of something infinitely more important than itself. If men had postponed the search for knowledge and beauty until they were secure, the search would never have begun.
The Professor Is In
Last Friday, spent the day with the faculty at Santa Margarita Catholic High School in Orange County. I had a great time meeting their faculty and dialoging about the challenges and opportunities created in this moment. Whatever they thought of what I had to say about AI, I think what resonated most was my reading of “Cookies” from Frog and Toad to set the scene for our conversation around AI and academic integrity. Part of my goal to read children’s literature to adults whenever I can.
Most of all, the message I wanted to leave them with is one of encouragement: the what and how of the work they do with their students may be changed by AI, but the central motivation—to help cultivate young people guided by the love of Jesus and filled with compassion, humility, justice, and goodness—is not.
Leisure Line
We almost always fly through JFK when we visit the East Coast, but not this time. It was fun to experience LaGuardia and see the changes to the terminal. I hadn’t been through LGA in at least a decade, and it looks quite different now. This fountain in the middle of the food court area of the terminal was a nice attraction. The kids sure loved it.
Still Life
I opened the lid of my coffee cup and was greeted by this neat arrangement of water droplets.
Wonderful piece, Josh. It pairs nicely with my re-reading Walden to help write a review of Nicolas Carr's latest book, Superbloom. Thoreau calls the railroad and the telegraph “pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end.” That is a wonderful line to explain why efficiency and optimization are not end goals themselves, and that we ought pay more attention to what we are trying to accomplish.
As you say, the foundations of what we build are the relations we make with other people, not the pretty toys that so occupy our attention.
The point you make about our obligation to talk with students about AI feels urgent. We should resist pressures for teachers to "get on the same page" when it comes to AI—disagreement is healthy and necessary—but we should all engage with students about their experience with the technology and explain our views on its educational value.
Well thought out and well written. I'm interested to hear your thoughts on the role of personalized learning in the AI assisted educational landscape. Would it help keep the human in learning?