Core Academics
Core Academics:
Almost universally, interviewees highlighted the continuing importance of K-12 students mastering command of core academic skills and knowledge. Math, reading, writing, science and history, and the skills they help develop remain the foundation for students' success in the future job market and as productive citizens.
Sal Khan
Founder & CEO, Khan Academy
“Some of the areas where we see high demand for jobs that are unlikely to be disrupted by AI are in things like the trades, becoming an electrician, in healthcare, becoming a nurse. And when I talk to people in these groups, they say, ‘We can't get enough people to enter an electrician apprenticeship program or into nurse training programs.’ What tends to be the rate limiting factor is the number of students who have mastered basic algebra or who can handle advanced high school level, biology or chemistry. So I think even in an AI world, even where a generative AI can do a lot of these skills, it's super important for our kids to have true mastery of some of these more basic academic skills. ”
Aimée Eubanks Davis
Founder & CEO, Braven
“I would say at the K-12 level making sure students truly can read by third grade and write and do algebra by 9th grade - truly do algebra - I don't think we should back off from those things. They're just core to learning and being an educated person.”
Daniel Willingham
Professor of Psychology, University of Virginia
“What needs to change inside children's heads? I can't think of anything.”
David Coleman
CEO, College Board
“I think the most immediate threat of the large language models of AI is to the very notion of writing and its contribution to thought. We are convinced that the students' command of a sentence is a powerful tool for teaching them how to think, for organizing thought.”
Roland Fryer
Professor of Economics, Harvard University
“I think science, reading, history, just the basics. What we need to do is double down on the fundamental ways that we've been educating kids for a long time. Well, let me rephrase that. How we were supposed to be educating kids for a very long time, but haven't.”
Shalinee Sharma
CEO and Co-Founder, Zearn
“Whatever happens in this AI future, math still has to be in the game. Math is indispensable because when we think about mathematics and about building a numerate mind, algebra is the only reasoning course that we all get to take. It's where we start to learn to break down and solve problems. And we do it on a page and we do it with symbols. And we can extrapolate that to breaking down problems across our whole life.”