The Mission Behind Day of AI ft. Jeff Riley | My EdTech Life 347

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 0:12

Hello, everybody. Yeah, welcome to another great episode of My EdTech Life. Thank you so much for joining me on this wonderful day. And wherever it is that you're joining us from around the world, thank you as always for all the likes, the shares, the follows. Thank you so much for engaging with our content and sharing our content. We really appreciate what we do. Actually, we appreciate all the love that you give us, and that's why we do what we do for you to bring you some amazing conversations. But all of this would not be possible if it wasn't for our amazing sponsors. So I want to give a big shout out to Book Creator, Eduate, Yellow Dig, and our newest sponsor, Peelback Education. Thank you so much for believing in our mission to bring these amazing conversations into our space so that we as educators can continue to grow professionally and personally too as well. And I am excited for today's show. I have an amazing guest, and of course, we're going to be talking about artificial intelligence, and we're going to be talking about uh so many great things as far as day of uh day of AI. We're gonna be talking about other programs and things that will be coming up with our amazing guest, Mr. Jeff Riley. Jeff, how are you doing today?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 1:28

Wonderful. Thanks so much for having me today.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 1:30

Thank you, Jeff. I really appreciate you joining, and thank you so much to your amazing team, also to for reaching out and choosing our wonderful platform to amplify your voice, your work, and the work that the rest of the team is doing as far as day of AI and all the great things that we'll be talking about this evening. But before we dive in, Jeff, for our audience members who may not be familiar with you just yet, can you please give us a little brief introduction and what your context is within the education space?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 2:03

Sure, my name's Jeff Riley. I did 32 years in public education. I started as a teacher. I think I did every job in between: school counselor, um, principal, deputy superintendent, superintendent. And the last six and a half years of my career I spent as the commissioner of education for the state of Massachusetts.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 2:24

Excellent. Wow. Well, I mean, that's great. Like coming around full circle, you actually got to see everything. Uh, I haven't quite gotten all that high in steps yet. Um, right now I'm at that district assessment, uh, district coordinator role. So hopefully I'll be able to see uh, you know, the education uh space through more lenses too. But I think that that's a wonderful perspective that you bring to this conversation and obviously being able to see so many things uh throughout the 32 years. But I'm definitely excited about what we're gonna be talking about today. So I want to ask you, you know, your transition into this and talking about obviously AI and generative AI and AI and education. Where did that begin?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 3:09

Well, you know, as I said, I had done uh over three decades in K-12 public service. Uh I was getting ready to what I call retire, retire. And uh our friends at MIT called and they said, Hey, do you want to help lead a nonprofit we're launching out of MIT focused on AI and education? And I said something which I think took them back. I said, Can I say what I want? And I think they were they were a little confused by that. And I said, Well, look, 15 years ago, we didn't really regulate social media and cell phone use, and it appears from research coming out that you know we've had rising rates of mental health issues with our kids. AI, I think, has some problems as well. Uh AI also can do amazing things, and I think it's going to chart you know the next revolution in education, but I want to make sure that we can focus on keeping kids safe first and foremost, uh, and then talking about the pedagogy behind it and how it can improve things in K-12 education. And they said yes, and so here I am.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 4:07

Excellent. Well, that is wonderful. So tell us a little bit about MIT Rays. Uh, just again, for our audience members that are not familiar with that, and of course, this program, tell us a little bit more about that, and of course, like you mentioned a little bit, the the extensive mission and the work that you're doing with them as well.

Jeffrey C. Riley: 4:24

Yeah, I mean, essentially who we are is we're a fusion of young MIT technologists and experienced read old uh educators like myself. They know the technology in a deep way and we know how to apply it in schools. And uh and it's just been a fascinating um kind of fusion of like-minded people who want our kids to use this technology safely and productively. And Day of AI, which was spawned out of MIT RAIS, uh, you know, really does three things. We train teachers and administrators, we help districts with policies, and then we build AI literacy curriculum, K-12, uh, for teachers.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 5:04

Excellent. Well, that is definitely something that is very much needed because believe it or not, I know that from November 2022, we're already here, November 2025. It's been, you know, we've seen so much. We've seen so many platforms that are coming in into classrooms, and uh, but we still see many school districts that are still not creating a policy yet. They haven't really discussed much. There's the conversation seems to kind of get a little bit of steam as the school year starts. But then, you know, as we go into that October slide and going into Christmas break, all that falls into the wayside because at least here in Texas, you know, we know that starting January, it is testing season, as we call it, because it's test after test after test, where those conversations kind of all of a sudden they just slide into non-existence, and then all of a sudden you have the summer slide, and then it picks up again that same August or September of that following year. And I think that's something that's very important that the work that you're doing, because at least here in our local area and our region regional area, I think there was there is only one school out of the many schools here in in our region one area that does have an AI policy. And that's something that is you know very alarming, being that we're already three years in with so many apps, and teachers are, you know, they welcome a lot of apps into the classrooms without maybe CTOs vetting them properly or networks, uh network specialists uh vetting them properly as far as CAPA, FERPA, where the data is stored and so on. So I think that what it is that you're trying to do and the awareness that you're bringing to educators is something that is definitely very important. And so, as we know, you know, since 2022, education has definitely turned, uh, you know, hit a major turning point. And like you mentioned, one thing that I do like that you talked about is partnering with MIT, where you say we have the the young crew that knows the tech, but then you have the experienced seasoned veterans that can tie in that pedagogy uh to really make sense of things in the classroom. So I want to ask you in your 32 years seeing just about anything and now working uh and partnering up with MIT Rays, what makes this a unique opportunity, not only for you doing this work, but other um, you know, entities that are doing this work for students and educators?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 7:37

Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, during my 32 years, we had a revolution called education reform, right? And that was basically the idea that people came together to get better outcomes for kids. A lot of times it was about increased dollars for schools in exchange for test scores and accountability standards, uh, all important architecture that we didn't have before in education. But if you look at kids' academic trajectory and their progress, for the first 15 years of education reform, kids across the country were moving up. Uh, but for the last 15 years or so, we've been flatlined. Now, some people posit we've been flatlined because uh education reform ran out of steam. Other people point to cell phones rising at that exact same time 15 years ago. Kids have lost the ability to pay attention. Whatever the case, I think, you know, we are grateful for what happened during ed reform, but we always realize that there's more that can be done. When we talk about artificial intelligence, uh, this is the first time that I've seen technology change have the ability to change education in a fundamental way. Education has always been looking to technology as you know, for silver bullets, right? If every kid just had a laptop, uh the problem would be solved, right? But it hasn't actually turned out that way. Um, this is the first time I think technology will be able to change educational practice so that we can get demonstrably improved academic outcomes for kids. And let me tell you how. Uh, first and foremost, when I speak to teachers about this, I tell them AI is not gonna replace teachers. There's a personal relationship involved in teaching that I think is never gonna go away. But what it can do for teachers is make their lives easier and take away a lot of the administrative burden they have so that they can get back to focusing on what they got into teaching for, building exciting, engaging lessons for kids. And when teachers see that and when they see examples of how it can make their lives easier, I'll give you one. Uh I was a special education teacher for a long time, and uh I used to write spend hours writing IEPs. Well, there's a program now called Magic School, and in its suite of services is an IEP generator, which can really quickly build you a foundation for a document like that. It doesn't mean you could just let the technology do all the work. You still have to take your expertise as a special ed teacher and infuse that into the document. So it's in truly an individualized education plan, but it can save you a lot of time that you wouldn't otherwise have that you could then go back and make even better lessons for kids. Um, and the second thing this technology is going to be able to do for us is uh it's gonna be able to differentiate and personalize instruction in a way we never could before. And if you have a classroom of 30 with a myriad of reading levels, you suddenly can get kids information on the same academic standards written at their particular grade level, whether an eighth-grade science class has mostly kids reading at a middle school level, but a couple of kids reading at a second grade level, and another two or three kids reading at a college level, you can actually beam the appropriate written coursework to them at their level without embarrassing them, and then they can still all do the activity together. And what that means is the kid who's reading at a college level who might have checked out because he's bored can suddenly be re-engaged. And the kid who's reading at a second grade level can now access the information and feel like they understand what's going on, so they're not overwhelmed. And so to be able to differentiate or personalize instruction like that, that's gonna be a new revolution in education.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 12:21

Absolutely. You know, one of the things that you mentioned there, which is that differentiation component. To me, uh, you know, working here in my area with here in the southern tip of Texas, where we're right across, you know, from Mexico, you know, and we do have a lot of students that their first language is Spanish. We've got a lot of students that are emergent bilinguals. And I think when I was in the classroom, I mean, just the difficulty that there was in being able to take what we are teaching them as far as the lesson is concerned, and then having to either send it to somebody at our service center to be able to translate, or I myself doing the translating. And back then it was just strictly just Google Translate, and we didn't have the tools that we have now. But I think to me, that's one of the important pieces because being in the classroom, I remember when there would be students that would need to be uh, they had a pull-out teacher or they had a a push teacher that would come in and uh, you know, be be mindful of helping the student out and so on. And, you know, at that age, and really at any age, a lot of students, you know, can be just downright mean and you know, seeing like, hey, uh, you need the additional help, or they get pulled out for so on and so forth. But what I what I like that you mentioned is that there are through the ability of some of these platforms to be able to differentiate where everybody can take, you know, can be learning at the exact in the exact same classroom, but obviously they don't know that they're reading the content at different levels and they're still being able to understand and be part of the whole class and not being singled out. You know, I think that's something that is very important and that I really do like and enjoy. And obviously the the the how quickly teachers can do this now, because imagine from one day to the next, you get a new student that comes in and maybe comes in. We've seen students come in from Vietnam here, China, Korea, um, and so on. And now to be able to immediately translate that text into that language and maybe either at their level, slightly lower, but depending, but they're still getting that content. And I think that's something that is fabulous that I am seeing. But I want to ask you now, because I I know that we see obviously the good that this can do, and we also see some teachers too that are still a little bit afraid, they are a little reluctant. Some may just really see this as oh great, like this is something else that is added to my plate that I'm gonna have to manage and guard against. So, what might be some things or or things that you currently share alongside with your team when you go do school visits or district visits to help teachers feel a little bit more comfortable, to let them know that this isn't something that you're just gonna manage or guard against, but making them feel confident and actually using it?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 15:15

Well, it's such a great question. And I I think it starts with what I spoke about at the top of the show, which is we don't think uh AI is gonna replace teachers. We think uh teachers and their ability to work individually with kids and have that personal relationship with kids is the foundation of all education. Um, and we also think, however, that these AI technology can make teachers' lives easier in a variety of ways. And we show them uh examples. Uh, I talked to you earlier about uh you know special education and building an IEP, but something as simple as a letter home to a parent, let's say there's a student in your class that's acting up and inappropriate, they've really frustrated you, you want to write this angry letter, but you don't want to send an angry letter to a parent, so you can ask ChatGPT, hey, can you can you make this so it's forceful but also professional? And it can do something really quickly for you to give you a basis, and you can go back in and tweak it a little bit, but it can save you that time and money and all that hand-wringing you do about how to word how Johnny acted in class today. Uh, and so I think there's a real value to that. If you're a teacher and you have great lessons already, we can show you examples of how to infuse AI into that great lesson and make it even better, right? And so I just think um what this can be shown as is a tool that can really uh support a teacher in a way that they've never had the support before. And that districts haven't had the time or money to give to teachers, right? And oftentimes we leave our teachers, you know, on an island in their own classroom, and and hope is not a strategy, right? But to be able to have such a powerful tool like this um can really uh make the teachers' life easier and help them be more effective in their practice.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 17:01

Yeah. Yeah, and I agree with all of that. You know, one of the things that I do want to add, um, Jeff, is for me, it it really just also starts at the top, you know, as far as leadership. And with your experience as a superintendent, I am sure that there were things that would come through you that you say, okay, you know what, I I got to lead by example. And so as it goes down into your curriculum directors and then from your directors to the teachers and so on, I mean, I think that that buy-in too at the very top level and stating like, hey, this is our mission, this is what we intend to do, and maybe it could just be one small step, but there definitely has to be that buy-in at the district level because I've seen so many things, you know, through through my years where there will be initiatives that get started and then all of a sudden they start off great and then it just kind of fizzles out before it even gets to the campuses. But again, because there is so much that is happening, but we definitely need to make time to learn what is out there, the new technology, and also how it can be embedded into our curriculum. So that's something that is great. Now, I want to switch it up here, like you know, so now we talked about teachers, but now I want to talk to you about students. And uh recently I had a wonderful guest, Amber Ivy, on the show, and we talked about AI literacy, and we hear this, you know, so many times in a day. I'm on LinkedIn and everybody talks about AI literacy. Where uh a friend of mine posted it, said, Does anybody like feel like they really don't know what AI literacy is? I mean, they say it so much, there's so many definitions that are out there, but there has never been something solid, and I guess it can mean whatever it means to whoever it is that you're talking to and districts and so on. But I want to ask you, you know, as far as uh AI literacy for students, what would you say would be the most important thing to start for a let's say a district that is just wanting to start and implementing a policy? What should be the first step for students to learn about AI literacy?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 19:10

So I think when you talk about AI literacy, that could be an all-encompassing term. And you with your assessment background probably know that the PISA International Assessment in 2029 is going to start testing AI literacy skills as a discrete examination uh that year. But I think about AI literacy in a more simplified way, which is how do we teach kids to be healthy skeptics of this technology? And so, because we know uh it's a profound tool, but we also know it makes mistakes. There's bias, it hallucinates, and sometimes makes up answers. Um, and there's a lot of funny examples out there, right? And so I think for us, what we need to do is to teach kids uh what AI is and what it's not. This is a giant prediction machine, right? It's not a real human. We've got a lot of kids right now who have an AI companion. Think of that as like an AI imaginary friend that they talk to and have a relationship with. Uh, unfortunately, some of these companions have aided in kids harming themselves, up to and including suicide. Uh and I think if kids knew from the outset what this technology is and what it's not, that might prevent a kid from uh treating an AI companion bot as a real person. And so, how do you teach kids to be skeptical of this technology? Uh, I'll give you a couple of examples. We know it hallucinates. Um there's a famous uh example out there where someone asked, uh, I don't know if it was Chad or Gemini or which program it was, but how do I keep the cheese from sliding off my pizza? And the answer was add an eighth of a cup of glue. Okay, that's not a great answer. Uh, and it's believed that uh AI got that answer by scanning its data, and it was either on a Twitter uh tweet. Or a Reddit thread where someone sarcastically said, add an eighth of a cup of glue. The computer didn't know it was sarcastic and just presented it as honest information. Where do cheeseburgers come from? Cheeseburgers come from cheeseburger trees. That was how that was produced recently. Well, there is no cheeseburger trees unless they're in Texas, in which case I'm coming tomorrow. But, you know, kids need to see the mistakes that this technology is not all-knowing and all-powerful. And if they have that kind of skepticism, then they can treat it for what it is, which is a tool that can help you. And they can start learning about how to make sure you reduce getting bad information. One way to do that, for example, is through prompting. How do you teach kids to be really exact in their questions or their prompting of an AI bot so that you get better information? If you ask something generic, you may not get a very good answer. If you're very specific and detailed, you're more likely to get better information. And so how do you teach kids how to do that? And we have activities that are some of which are analog, where we teach kids how to think about AI in their world without ever having to touch a computer.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 23:41

Excellent. You know, and I think that's something that is very important too. Like you mentioned, not only them learning, you know, how effective or the, you know, just the misses that the technology does have so they can build those skills. But I'm thinking too, you know, as far as maybe a district, like I mentioned to you here in our area, there's only one district that had an AI policy. But I think that even the student body can be used uh to be have sort of like a platform or an advisory board of students to see how AI would be implemented and how they would use it or ethically and learning about the bias and so on. So I'm thinking about that too in that sense. In your experience as you visited campuses or visited districts and you know, through your research, is this something that possibly you have seen where districts have taken into account uh bringing in the student body and maybe a small subset or a group to help them um build and uh or be part of the building process of an AI policy?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 24:46

Yes, uh in fact, we promote such a thing uh through our network. Uh we think you know, AI policy is a tricky subject because school committees uh immediately want to put out an AI policy. But the reality is this technology is changing so quickly, you'd have to change your policy probably every six months. Uh so instead, what we say to people is start at the high school in your student handbook. There's a lot of talk about cheating and plagiarism, okay. And start from a place of your district's values. We value academic integrity. Great. Then a kid needs to disclose if they're going to use an AI bot for their work, and a teacher needs to disclose if they're if they want them to use it or not. And just start simply and dip your toe in the water. Kids can be part of this conversation. Kids, particularly at the high school uh level right now, uh, have an intuitive sense of this technology. They're seen as digital natives. People like me are seen as digital immigrants. They were born into it. There was no internet for the first 20 years of my life. I'm an immigrant into it. Um, and so they understand the technology, but they've also seen the malicious effects of technology uh through social media and other aspects with their friends. So a lot of times we see kids are pretty wary about AI and have really good thoughts about how to incorporate that into their lives. And so asking them to be part of the conversation is crucial.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 26:14

Excellent. Yeah, and you know, that kind of lines up with, like I mentioned to you in my most recent episode with Amber Ivy, you know, I asked her the same question because she works with districts, they're in the Baltimore area, and she helps out. And I asked her, you know, what is one of the most surprising things? And so she mentioned too that, you know, this the students nowadays having access to technology at such an early age, she said, we often don't give them enough credit that they are able to pick up on deep fakes faster than us. That, like you mentioned, that for the first 20 years of our lives, there wasn't any internet at all whatsoever until like later on. And so they are very tech savvy in that aspect. And so she she mentioned, you know, and right along with you, like the importance of that, that they are familiar with the technology, and it's just a matter of us to also be able to help them out and lead them into that uh ethical conversations on how to use it correctly and making sure that they understand, you know, some of the limitations that the technology does have and having those conversations. And I think that's great because it also builds uh, you know, community and just building as many stakeholders as you can bring in. I always say, you know, we can also bring in parents to talk to them and explain to them also the types of technologies and so on. Because I think that oftentimes for parents too, it's like they don't know what they don't know and they hear stuff, but you know, they hear stuff on media, social media, wherever it is, and they may not be getting the correct information. So being able to have them also be part of the conversation, I think, would be very crucial as well.

Jeffrey C. Riley: 27:54

Yeah, so two things. One, uh, you know, we really believe deeply in student leadership on all things AI. One of the things we're doing on our tour this year is we're we're coming back to Boston and MIT and the Edward M. Kennedy Institute, which is an exact replica of the U.S. Senate, and we're flying in two kids from every state to serve as uh state senators to draft a national AI policy, um, which will be done long before the adults ever get together and have a national AI policy, because we believe in their expertise, right? We really think they have to be part of the conversation. The second thing, and it's it's right on point to what you're alluding to now, is parents have to be deeply involved in this conversation in a way we've never allowed parents uh to be involved in schools before. Uh I we have a situation now. Uh we've partnered with a group called Common Sense Media to build a parent toolkit on all things AI to help them have discussions with their kids about this new technology, recognizing that parents don't always know as much about the technology as their kids do, right? And so we've created videos to help start these conversations and toolkits to help with questions and guided readings to help them understand what's happening. Why is that important? Well, based on the research from Common Sense Media, 70% or more of kids right now have an AI companion bot or its equivalent, but only 30% of parents think their kids are using any kind of AI, much less an AI companion. So there's a wide gulf between what kids are doing and what parents think they're doing. And we need to we need to bridge that gap quickly and make sure in order to keep kids safe and to be on the same page with schools, uh, that everybody is kind of rowing in the same direction.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 29:39

Yeah. And I think that's so great that you've partnered up with Common Sense Media because that is one of the resources. Uh, when I, you know, last year and for the last seven years, we would do Technology Tuesdays with parents where we would meet with parents once a month. And I talked to them about digital citizenship. We talk about cyberbullying, we talk about those things. And of course, the most recent conversation from 22 on was, you know, AI. We were talking about, you know, chatbots, companions, and so on. And I think for it was just an eye-opening experience for a lot of those parents, like you mentioned, to be able to hear that, oh, I had no idea that this technology did this. And here I'm I'm hearing my child talk about, you know, an AI companion, an AI bot, or this platform, and so on, but they had no clue what was happening. So I think that I really and and I one of the resources was Common Sense Media because they had some great stuff both in English and Spanish that I can share here with our area. So I would create, you know, like a little uh, I guess a hyperlink uh document where they can go in and have those resources to be able to start those conversations and talk to their children because I think oftentimes that's really what parents need, and sometimes it can be very overwhelming. So I'm glad that you guys have partnered up with Common Sense Media because they're definitely uh a great resource. Now, uh I'm kind of changing things up a little bit. Um, I want to talk a little bit about the responsible AI for America's youth. I know that this is something that Day of AI and MIT launched. So can you tell us a little bit about what that is and you know, where can we look out for it as far as educators or parents uh and students are concerned?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 31:19

Yeah, so this is part of our national tour that we're doing this year. We are um crisscrossing the country, doing different events in schools and districts and communities. Uh, we're also training people virtually for free if they're interested. Uh all you have to do is go to our website, uh day ofaiusa.org or dayofai.org. Either will get you in. And if you just simply put in your uh email, don't worry, we won't spam you, but you'll get behind the cur you'll get behind the curtain. You'll be able to sign up for free virtual classes. If you want to do something deeper with us as an organization, as many districts do, you can do that. You can see all the free curriculum, you could see the parent uh kit and resource kit in English and Spanish. We just put out the second video last week. Uh, and there's just a myriad of resources uh that people can have access to just to dip their toe in the water, right? We recognize that teachers are a busy group of people. We know it's the holiday season, but if you have, you know, a few minutes uh over the holiday break, uh go to our website and just maybe check out a few things. And I think it could be eye-opening for folks and help them in their practice going forward.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 32:27

Excellent. And we'll definitely make sure that we link that in the show notes as well. That way, when uh whoever might be listening, you know, our educators that are parents too as well, want wanting more resources or uh be able to share those that program with the staff, or maybe even do, you know, an email blast to parents to be able to share that. I think that would be something huge and definitely beneficial to continue that conversation and to continue to grow in the knowledge of you know AI and generative AI and how it's being used. And again, having great resources for parents is definitely something that is very helpful. So I want to ask you too, you know, as far as your partnership with MIT Rays and obviously talking about um the responsible AI for uh America's youth, I wanted to ask you too a little bit about America's youth AI Festival. So, Jeff, tell us a little bit about that because this sounds something that is definitely very sounds very interesting. And I think that this is something that we definitely need to share here on the podcast as well.

Jeffrey C. Riley: 33:32

Yeah, so uh our our you know, we're going across country for our this year, doing a lot of events um at schools and and local community organizations. But we're coming back to Boston in the summer, uh, where we're gonna focus on student leadership. Uh, I talked to you about having two students from every state service senators, but there's also challenge contests uh that we have on our website where kids can use AI for a better world and try to develop something that will help the planet. Uh they can use AI in the arts, uh, me, myself, and AI, and there's just different things where kids can demonstrate their leadership with artificial intelligence. Uh, and we're gonna like whine and dine them and fly them in and celebrate them and and give them uh kind of classes to see and really, you know, see some of the cutting-edge things happening at the MIT Media Lab, which is uh a place inside MIT where a lot of smart people are thinking up the next generation of things. Sometimes I feel like an imposter having my office there because I'm surrounded by very smart people. I'm just a lowly teacher.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 34:36

Hey, no, definitely not just a lowly teacher. You definitely have some lots of wisdom and great perspective because, like you said, you know, the young guys are very smart as far as the technology is concerned, but you know, just to be able to be that bridge from taking that complex concept and being able to, you know, be that bridge to bring it into the K-12 space, definitely not a lowly thing.

Jeffrey C. Riley: 35:02

Yeah, I shouldn't say lowly, I would say simple teacher, but uh but your point is taken, and I think those the folks there do appreciate having the practitioners who have been in the field uh where we have where we have expertise, right? That they don't have. Yes. I would still say it's humbling to be there because you know, yeah.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 35:19

Well, humbling for sure, you know, definitely. But man, I am so thankful, uh Jeff, for the work that you're doing with Day of AI and your partnership with MIT Rays and just being able to travel the country, like you said, and also just really focusing on that being uh that student involvement and making them part of the conversation. I think that this could be something huge and it's something that is definitely needed because, like you said, you know, working with these young men and women uh that are just excelling and are you know great with the tech, it's like second nature for them. Like you mentioned, it's probably a lot faster to get the meeting done with them than getting all the adults in the room all at once and be able to just really even uh be on the same page as far as what to do. So I'm so thankful for your movement and the initiatives that you all are taking. And I want to ask you, you know, just you know, being in this role and seeing what you've seen and the experience that you've had, you know, we know that um, you know, AI for America's youth is something that is definitely not just thrown together, but it's research-led and and it's uh a research-led movement. So I want to ask you, you know, what would your your vision of this for the next five years be? What are some of the outcomes that you would love to see that comes from this great partnership?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 36:43

Yeah, I appreciate the question. When I, you know, when I speak publicly about this, I show a slide with a picture of three title waves. And in the first caption, uh the gentleman's trying to hold back the title wave with his hands. And in the second caption, he's buried his head in the sand. And in the third caption, he's surfing the wave. And what I say to teachers is all right, let's go surfing. But actually, we don't even have to start surfing. Let's just dip our toe in the water, right? And so what I hope is that uh regardless of where you are with technology, you'll be open to the idea that this is coming, right? AI is already here. Every time you try to send a text and it tries to predict your next word, that's artificial intelligence. Every time you're on Netflix and it tries to curate for you movies it thinks you will like based on your past experience, that's artificial intelligence. We were in Arizona recently and took Waymo's uh self-driving cars, which we don't have yet in Boston. I'm not sure that's going to work out here, but that's uh that's artificial intelligence. And so the idea just to be open to it, and when we can show teachers how this can make your life easier, and also how to take your already great lessons, you don't have to throw at the baby with the bathwater and make them even better. Uh, people are are pretty eager to sign up. And you know, we say, How do we measure this? I measure this by uh, you know, when I present publicly, how many people uh say, Can I have your materials? Can I can I use this in my classroom? And they actually go back and and steal our stuff because that's that's what good teachers do is they take ideas and they bring them back to their own classroom, right? At least that's what I did for many years. Like teachers would walk over broken glass to get something that could make their classroom more enjoyable, more engaging, more fun. Uh, and I think AI can do that.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 38:30

Excellent. Well, Jeff, thank you so much for just sharing the wonderful work that you're doing. And I think this is a wonderful mission that you get to be on, and of course, everybody that works alongside you, you know, being able to travel across the country and share this message, share the learning and making everybody feel part of something that is this big day of AI, MIT research or MIT Rays, the research lab and everything. I think that this is something that is fantastic, that definitely needs to be shared. And I'm definitely excited and thankful that you got to come here on this podcast, and we can definitely blast it out and share it and amplify the work that you're doing. But before we wrap up, Jeff, I always love to end the show with the following three questions. So hopefully that you are ready to go. So, as we know, every superhero has a pain point or weakness, and for Superman, kryptonite was his weakness. So I want to ask you, uh, Jeff, in the current state of education, what would you say is your current edu kryptonite?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 39:35

Yes, well, I would say our teachers are our real superheroes, and as an administrator, uh, I try to be a facilitator of that. But when I scan the education sector, I think what's holding us back, what could be our kryptonite right now, is something you may we may not be talking about often, but it's this idea of local control. Now, typically, I believe in local control where districts get to kind of make their decisions on what's best for their kids. But I think with artificial intelligence, this should be viewed as our sputnik moment, uh, where nationally we should have a movement to make sure that all of our kids have access to this material so that they can be uh ready for the future economy. I said at the beginning that I didn't think AI was going to replace humans, but I do think in the future uh people with AI skills are gonna replace those without AI skills. And if that's the case, then all of our kids need to have this training. And you spoke about how only a few districts have gone down this path. I think if we had a nationwide movement that kind of overrode local control, which I very rarely asked for in my life, um, I think this would be the time because we see other countries are taking a much more uh intensive approach to artificial intelligence, whether that's China or Colombia, Dubai, I mean, there's different places that that are out there um really going for this. And I worry a little bit that our propensity to do local control will create kind of a patchwork quilt of uh implementation versus if we could come together as a country, and I know that's hard to do now, right? I mean, it's we're a pretty polarized country, but I'd like to think the one thing we agree on is we want what's best for our kids. Um and in that world, maybe that's where we could find common ground and set them up for future success by really doing this well to make sure the kids knew how to use the technology safely and productively. It would be embarrassing in 2029 if we, the country that created artificial intelligence, scored number 28 on the test of all countries, right? But I'm afraid if we don't do something that's more uh nationwide, I think we might be in danger of doing just that. Excellent.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 41:49

All right, great answer. Definitely a lot to take in there, but makes really great sense, and I am definitely with you on that. All right, Jeff, question number two if you could have a billboard with anything on it, what would it be and why?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 42:04

Uh well, this will be a little personal for me. I would say uh eyes back on the road, focus on what you're doing is what it would say on the billboard. As someone that's a little bit ADD, uh sometimes I can get caught off track and looking around rather than focusing on what I'm doing. So a reminder to stay focused, whether it's on artificial intelligence or anything in education, would probably be what I'd say.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 42:28

There you go. Or even just stay focused on the Exactly. There you go. All right. And my last question for you, Jeff, is if you could trade places with a single person for a day, who would that be and why?

Jeffrey C. Riley: 42:42

So her name is Maya Riley, and she is my 20-year-old daughter. Uh, she's in college now, but she's studying overseas in Copenhagen in Denmark, and she's visited this semester, I think, 12 different countries besides Copenhagen. So she's truly living her best life. Daddy's homeworking. So I'd like to trade with her for a day to see how she's living her life.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 43:06

Oh, that is great. Well, that's a great answer, Jeff. I really appreciate that. And Jeff, thank you so much for today's conversation. We will definitely make sure that we put the link in for all everything on our show notes, Day of AI. We'll definitely make sure that we put your contact info there for LinkedIn or any social media, also as well, just so that all our educators, all our listeners, parents, um, you know, can make sure that they get information or more information, I should say, on Day of AI and the resources that you have available. As I know that that would be something that would be beneficial not only for a parent, but also for districts across the country. So definitely thankful for you, the work that you're doing and that your team is doing. And of course, to all our listeners, please make sure that you visit our website at myedtech.life where you can check out this amazing episode and the other 345 wonderful episodes where I promise you will find a little knowledge nugget that you can sprinkle onto what you are already doing. Great. So please make sure you visit our website. And again, thank you as always for all of your support and a big shout out to our sponsors. Thank you so much to Book Creator, Yellow Dig, Eduate, and Peelback Education. Again, if it isn't, if it wasn't for you, we wouldn't be doing what we're doing and bringing these amazing conversations uh into our education space again, so that we may all continue to reap from them and continue to grow. So thank you as always for joining us. And until next time, my friends, don't forget, stay techie.