Greg WilsonA "food desert" is an area that has limited access to affordable, nutritious food. By analogy, many people live in "learning deserts": public schools and libraries are struggling to stay afloat due to chronic under-funding, so many teachers are only able to provide the educational equivalent of Kraft slices on white bread. 1/2
I think about this whenever people argue about the impact of genAI on teaching and learning. I think about what it's like to chat with Claude vs. what it's like to sit in a run-down schoolroom doing drill exercises for a burned-out teacher working a 60 hour week and paying for supplies out of her own pocket, or in a 400-person lecture hall at college that's no more interactive than a YouTube video. I think about what it's like when your choice is Taco Bell vs. Pizza Express, and I feel sad. 2/2
Olivier Leroy@gvwilson I do not get it, do you think genAi will solve inequality in education?
@defuneste no, definitely not - I think that many of the people criticizing it are comparing it to an ideal that only the lucky and well-off actually have access to. It's not good - we have allowed the alternative to become bad for many, many kids (and adults).
@gvwilson in France the ideal of public schools covering the territory was not that far from off (it came also with downside like trying to erase regional languages). Having school “deserts” is as much a political decision than not having them and i think this is independent of genAI. In North Carolina money is diverted from public schools to cover private schools for “school choice” reasons…