The Poynter Fellowship in Journalism presents
Audrey Watters, Education journalist and scholar:
“Challenging the AI Hype: Why Silicon Valley’s ‘Classroom of the Future’ is a Cold War Fantasy.”
Audrey Watters examines the parallels between Silicon Valley’s sales pitch for “AI”-enhanced schools and Cold War fantasies about a high-tech “classroom of the future.” Watters shows that today’s rhetoric about AI’s potential to ‘revolutionize’ a failing education system echoes the national panic that took hold after the Soviet Union’s successful launch of the first man-made satellite. Watters, the author of Teaching Machines and a vocal critic of education technology, argues that since Sputnik, politicians and business leaders have remained stuck in Cold War fantasies, continually recycling the same dangerous vision of replacing teachers with robots.
Audrey Watters is a journalist and scholar who explores the intersection of education, technology and power. The creator of the influential blog Hack Education, Watters’ is known for her skepticism of Silicon Valley’s assorted ‘fixes’ for schooling,a role she likens to being “ed tech’s Cassandra.” She is the author of several books, including Teaching Machines: The History of Personalized Learning (MIT Press, 2023), which explored the now century-old dream of replacing teachers with robots. Watters is currently at work on a book about AI and education.This event is co-sponsored by the Department of Political Science, Education Studies Program and The Politic