Learning Curve
By Jeff Young
What does it mean to teach and learn in the age of generative AI? Join host Jeff Young as he talks with educators, tech leaders and students, aiming to cut through the hype and inform a conversation about how education can adapt to AI — and about what kinds of learning need protecting amid the AI gold rush.
23 episodes
All Episodes
Embracing Institutional Incoherence to Preserve University Social Formation
Universities fail when they impose uniform AI policies across campus. Embracing institutional inconsistency allows conflicting teaching approaches to coexist, which preserves the social friction and cognitive struggle necessary for genuine student learning and development.
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Leveraging AI to Drive Structural Change in Education
Standard AI tools often hinder learning by encouraging students to offload their thinking. To see real progress, institutions should set up teaching guardrails that require students to engage in productive struggle. They should also focus on using automation to clear administrative hurdles rather than simply deploying general-purpose chatbots.
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How AI Efficiency Erodes Collaborative Learning in Higher Education
Generative AI is wearing down the collaborative culture that deep learning requires. Universities need to redesign their curricula to prioritize what some call hard fun and social interaction. This shift will help students develop essential human skills instead of simply optimizing for efficiency.
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Prioritizing Cognitive Development Over Institutional AI Adoption
Universities risk weakening cognitive development when they prioritize AI driven efficiency over the value of intellectual struggle. The real competitive advantage comes from cultivating reasoned uncertainty and teaching students to interrogate technology instead of passively consuming it.
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Protecting Learning Struggles to Build Resilient Human Expertise
Liberal arts colleges gain a competitive edge by protecting the struggle of learning. By prioritizing deep thinking over shortcuts driven by artificial intelligence, these institutions cultivate essential human skills that machines cannot replicate.
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Why Replacing Human Labor With AI Creates Systemic Chaos
Replacing human workers with AI agents often creates systemic chaos rather than efficiency. Master human-centric skills like leadership and discernment to gain a competitive advantage that machines cannot replicate or replace.
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Systemic Labor Realities Behind AI-Integrated Academic Assessment Redesign
AI detection tools rely on the flawed toupee fallacy. They catch only low-quality work while missing everything else. Maintaining academic integrity requires moving away from policing final outputs and instead redesigning curricula to prioritize the student thinking process.
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How Generative AI Dilutes Creative Intent and Authorship
Generative AI provides speed but sacrifices creative intent, as it replaces thousands of deliberate human choices with automated output. A genuine competitive advantage now belongs to those who commit to labor intensive, human led creative processes.
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Prioritizing Community Trust Over Top-Down AI Deployment
AI adoption fails when companies treat it as a technical rollout instead of a human challenge. By moving away from top-down mandates toward community-led literacy, leaders can turn skepticism into participation and secure long-term integration.
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How AI Can Free Up Human Time--But Only If Institutions Choose To Reinvest It
AI doesn't dehumanize college admissions--it exposes a deeper failure: schools are automating to cut costs, not connection. The real edge? Using AI to free up time for meaningful human conversations that boost yield, trust, and fit.
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Reframing AI Expertise: Enmeshment Within Disciplines, Not Technology
AI's true impact in higher education lies not in technology, but in fundamentally rethinking expertise and curricula. Embrace this shift to prepare students for an AI-enmeshed future.
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Cognitive Surrender: AI's Hidden Risk to Human Agency
AI adoption risks "cognitive surrender," where we defer our reasoning to AI, potentially eroding essential human skills and identity. Learn how to harness AI without sacrificing your intellectual agency.
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Liberal Arts Colleges Thrive by Cultivating Unique Human Skills in AI Era
As AI automates knowledge work, liberal arts education uniquely cultivates essential human skills like critical thinking and ethical reasoning, creating a surprising competitive advantage for future resilience.
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AI's Threat to Democracy: Cultivating Agency Over Passivity
AI poses a hidden threat to democracy: not deepfakes, but a creeping passivity that erodes individual agency and hollows out governance, prioritizing outcomes over participation.
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AI's Creative Disruption: Democratization Versus Devaluation of Craft
AI accelerates creation, but can devalue human craft and blur originality. Explore how to harness AI's speed while upholding integrity and recognizing genuine human contribution.
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AI Efficiency's Hidden Costs: Re-evaluating Human Value and Skills
AI's promise of efficiency hides hidden costs, forcing a re-evaluation of human value and collaboration. Learn to complement AI, not compete, to gain a future advantage.
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Rote Memorization: Strategic Imperative for Cognitive Agency in AI Era
AI's ease risks eroding our cognitive abilities. Re-embracing rote memorization is crucial for deep understanding and maintaining intellectual agency in an age of instant answers.
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AI's Paradox: Diminishing Human Agency Through Efficient Learning
AI adoption risks diminishing critical thinking and creativity, turning efficient output into shallow learning. Prioritize human agency and the learning process over AI-generated products.
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AI's Assault on Visual Truth Erodes Trust in Journalism
AI is eroding trust in visual evidence, making it harder to discern truth. Learn how to navigate this new information landscape and gain an advantage in understanding reality.
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AI's Business Model Conflicts With Child Development, Demanding Age Assurance
Tech's profit-driven design conflicts with child development, creating attention-capture products harmful to young brains. Age verification is minimal, demanding a shift to age assurance and assuming users are children by default.
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AI Companies Must Implement Guardrails Against Academic Fraud
AI companies can prevent academic fraud with a single prompt change, yet their inaction devalues education and harms honest students.
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AI Enhances Skilled Trades Through Communication and Efficiency
AI enhances skilled trades by improving customer communication and accelerating learning, freeing up valuable repair time and boosting earning potential.
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AI Companions Foster Unhealthy Attachments by Simulating Friendship Asymmetrically
AI companions offer simulated friendship without reciprocity, potentially fostering unhealthy attachments and poor social habits, especially for vulnerable users.
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