"I can boss my robot overlords around and go, 'I wanna try this thing.'" That line right there? That's the whole episode with Dustin Rimmey. This week Dr. Fonz sits down with Dustin Rimmey, aka Rimmey, a 19-year Kansas educator who went from "programming languages just don't stick in my brain" to building his own classroom tools with nothing but a keyboard and a stubborn refusal to quit. No computer science degree. No dev team. Just what Rimmey calls "caveman prompting." You describe what you want. You fail. Yo...

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza sits down with Dr. Mark Zeiler, a 20+ year K-12 education veteran whose career spans ELA teacher, media specialist, assistant principal, dean, and operations and curriculum leadership in Florida. The conversation centers on one core idea: as AI accelerates and humanoid robots move closer to mainstream integration, the most adaptive, creative, empathetic, and transformative technology ever created is still the human being.

Ready Beats Finished ft. Marnie & Nick | My EdTech Life 366 What does it actually mean to be ready for the real world? Not finished. Not just checked out with a diploma. Ready. In this episode, I sit down with Marnie Stockman and Nick Coniglio , authors of The Business of You and Lead It Like Lasso, to talk about Blue, their app built to help middle school, high school, and college students discover who they are, learn to tell their own story, and step into the world with real confidence. This i...

What happens when a former curriculum director becomes an AI strategist for an entire state? You get the kind of zoomed-out view most of us in education never get to see.In this episode, I welcome back my good friend Karle Delo, AI Strategist at Michigan Virtual, for a real conversation about what's actually working in school districts, what's flopping, and what the secret AI culture in your building probably looks like right now.

What if the missing ingredient in your classroom isn't a new tool, a new curriculum, or another PD session, but curiosity itself? In this episode, I sit down with Olivia Odileke, founder of Spark Curiosity EDU, Education Week contributor, and creator of the Spark Curiosity GPT Coach. Olivia brings an industrial engineering background into the world of education, and her perspective on how we teach, how we evaluate, and how we use AI in classrooms is one you don't want to miss.

AI can write your design doc. It can build your storyboard. It can draft your script, your rubric, your assessment, your video outline, and half of your e-learning module before lunch. So what's left for the instructional designer? According to Jonathan De La Cruz, everything that actually matters.

What happens to your judgment when AI starts answering before you finish the question? In this episode, Dr. Fonz sits down with Cheryl Strauss Einhorn, founder of Decisive, decision-sciences educator at Cornell and the University of Miami, and author of the new book The Human Edge: Smarter Decisions in the Age of AI (Cornell Publishing, May8).

There's no opt-out button for AI. That's the reality Valerie Brock, Curriculum Lead at Day of AI, brings to this conversation, and it changes how we think about AI literacy in K-12. In this episode, Dr. Fonz sits down with Valerie to unpack what AI literacy actually means (hint: it's not prompt engineering), why early childhood classrooms belong in this conversation, and how Day of AI is building developmentally appropriate, tool-agnostic curriculum.

Episode 360: The #1 AI Governance Mistake Schools Are Making ft. Dr. Betsy Cooper What's the biggest mistake schools are making with AI right now? According to Betsy Cooper, it's not taking it seriously from day one. In this episode, Dr.Alfonso sits down with Betsy Cooper, Founder and Executive Director of the Aspen Policy Academy, for a powerful conversation on the AI governance decisions quietly reshaping schools — and what educators, leaders, and parents can do about it.

What happens when you take public high school students with zero computer science background — 87% of whom are below the federal poverty line — and put them in one of only two quantum computing programs for high schoolers in the entire nation?

What happens when two 19-year-olds look at education and say… this isn’t working? In this episode, I sit down with Almar Tishenko and Max Litvinenka, two young founders building Reading Rooms, a platform designed to rethink how students read, write, and receive feedback in the age of AI. This isn’t about replacing teachers. This is about giving them time back, strengthening critical thinking, and using AI the right way.

Student voice is one of the most powerful forces in education — but only when it has a real stage. In this episode, Dr. Fonz welcomes back returning guest Tim Belmont, Language Arts teacher and Technology Coordinator at Lyndhurst High School in New Jersey, for a rich conversation on what it actually means to give students an authentic voice — and the innovative project he built to make that a reality.

As a father of two and a 20-year tech industry veteran, Caleb built Chatperone not for investors or school district contracts, but for his own children first.

Dr. Alfonso sits down with Aaron Makelky of Descript to unpack the real future of podcasting beyond vanity metrics, beyond over-polished edits, and beyond the AI hype.

Four years after ChatGPT changed everything, schools are still treading water. In this episode, I sit down with Dr. Kip Glazer, principal of Mountain View High School, home of Google, and author of Ready to Lead With AI: A Practical Guide for School Leaders. Dr. Kip has been in this conversation since 2015 and she is bringing ALL of that experience to the table.

Neuroscience expert Dr. Mark Hobson reveals why educators MUST understand how AI works—and why your brain learns exactly like AI does.

Recorded live at TCEA, this bonus episode of My EdTech Life cuts through the EdTech noise to focus on what actually works in classrooms. Joined by Elaina Kloecker and Spencer Wright, Dr. Fonz unpacks why ease of use, strong pedagogy, and teacher agency matter more than shiny tools and usage minutes.

Is critical thinking becoming a lost skill in the age of AI? In Episode 352 of My EdTech Life, Dr. Alfonso Mendoza sits down with Melissa Morgan, Founder of Coraltalk , to explore why conversation, not content consumption, is the key to real learning. This episode dives deep into why oral assessment, dialogue-based learning, and conversational AI may be the most effective way to combat AI-assisted cheating while actually improving student understanding.

Why EdTech Usage Doesn’t Equal Impact ft. Dr. Paula Cushanick In this episode of My EdTech Life, I sit down with Dr. Paula Cushanick, known as Dr. C on TikTok , to unpack one of the most misunderstood ideas in education technology: EdTech usage does NOT equal impact. Districts often measure success through logins, minutes, and usage reports because they’re easy to pull. But Dr. Cushanick’s research and classroom experience tell a very different story. In this conversation, we dig into what actua...

In Episode 350 of My EdTech Life, Dr. Alfonso “Fonz” Mendoza sits down with Lindy Hockenbary (LindyHoc) , a K–12 EdTech advisor, strategist, and professional learning leader known for helping teachers make technology work for real learning. This conversation goes straight to the issues educators actually face, the “one more thing” overload, AI misconceptions, and how to move beyond AI detectors toward authentic assessments students can’t fake. Lindy breaks down how AI literacy fits inside core i...

How Mega Minds Brings Real-World CTE to Classrooms ft. Eric Tao & Austin Levinson | My EdTech Life 349 In Episode 349 of My EdTech Life, Dr. Alfonso “Fonz” Mendoza sits down with Eric Tao , Founder & CEO of Mega Minds , and Austin Levinson , veteran educator and learning designer, to unpack how immersive AI-powered simulations are reshaping Career and Technical Education (CTE). This conversation goes beyond AI hype. Eric and Austin explain why most AI tools in education focus on productivity ins...

Career and Technical Education is often overlooked, misunderstood, or siloed. In this episode of My EdTech Life, Dr. Alfonso Mendoza sits down with Tisha Richmond , veteran CTE educator and author of The Magical CTE Classroom , to unpack what meaningful, joyful, and real-world CTE learning actually looks like. Tisha shares her journey from the classroom to edtech and back again, why CTE teachers face unique challenges, and how intentional design can transform labs, kitchens, workshops, and hands...

In this episode of My EdTech Life, Jeff Riley breaks down the mission behind Day of AI and the work of MIT RAISE to help schools, districts, families, and students understand artificial intelligence safely, ethically, and with purpose. Jeff brings 32 years of experience as a teacher, counselor, principal, superintendent, and former Massachusetts Commissioner of Education. His transition to MIT RAISE reveals why AI literacy, student safety, and clear policy matter more than ever. Timestamps 00:00...

Today on My EdTech Life, I sit down with Kyle Sumrow , educator, developer, and Director of Outreach and Development at Tech My School, to break down Relief Roster , a powerful substitute management and volunteer coordination system designed to streamline the entire sub process for schools. Kyle shares how Relief Roster solves the daily scramble schools face with substitutes, onboarding, scheduling, PTO tracking, and volunteer management. We unpack how customizable schedules, skill-based sub ass...