Field: Education
Students use calculators to do math. Let them use ChatGPT to write.
Researchers tasked teachers with rating hundreds of essays, some written by students and others written by ChatGPT. Here's what they found.
New AI detection tool measures how “surprising” word choices are
A new AI detection tool that measure how "surprising" text is reportedly delivers far fewer false positives than existing options.
Einstein’s 7 rules for a better life
His fame extended far beyond the field of physics, as Einstein played major roles in politics, media, and even the everyday affairs of life.
“Resilience”: How a genocide scholar faces history’s darkest moments
Genocide historian Omer Bartov says studying his particularly challenging subject has made him more mentally resilient.
Brain stimulation could boost learning
Noninvasive brain stimulation while a person learns a new task in VR can improve their performance in the “real world.”
Dumbing down or wising up: how will generative AI change the way we think?
Artificial intelligence tools are now managing huge swathes of information on our behalf, potentially changing what and how we think.
UT med students can now get a dual degree in AI
The University of Texas at San Antonio has launched what it says is the US’s first dual degree in medicine and AI.
Life’s stages are changing – we need new terms and new ideas to describe them
The arc of adult development has changed over the past several decades, in ways that our psychological theories are still catching up with.
What are “meta-skills” and how can they supercharge your life?
There are many meta-skills out there, but feeling, seeing, dreaming, making, and learning are likely the most important in the modern world.
GPT AI will help teach the most popular course in the world
A Harvard professor is developing a GPT-based chatbot to help teach CS50, the most popular online course in the world.
“Please do not assume the worst”: Students want colleges to teach them how to use AI the right way
Students want to work with their communities, universities, and governments to figure out how to engage productively and responsibly with AI.
Large language models are biased. Can logic help save them?
MIT researchers trained logic-aware language models to reduce harmful stereotypes like gender and racial biases.
ChatGPT answers physics questions like a confused C student
When asked about physics, ChatGPT gave a mixture of true, false, relevant, irrelevant, and contradictory answers — all with authority.
ChatGPT in academia: Can it help with the research process?
Several researchers have already listed a chatbot as a co-author on academic studies, but ChatGPT is better in some areas than others.
An expert explains how you’re using ChatGPT wrong
ChatGPT is designed to produce strings of words that sound good in response to the words you give it – not to provide you with information.
The dawn of AI has come, and its implications for education couldn’t be more significant
AI like ChatGPT is forcing us to rethink education. But if we embrace it, it could empower both students and teachers.
“Personalized curriculums” could get kids to care about school again
Personalized learning has to potential to prepare learners who are self-regulating and self-motivated for life beyond school.
Parents: Don’t focus on happiness, help build resilience instead
Happiness emerges from resilience, which helps children regulate difficult emotions and stressful situations.
How neuroscience can make us better parents
Kids' brains develop in four main stages. Each has its own particular set of advancements and challenges for parents.
How college in prison is leading professors to rethink how they teach
College in prison reduces the chance of reoffending, but it also dramatically changes the perspective of the professors who teach them.
Walking to school is more likely to keep kids active as they age
Children who walk or bike to school at a young age are more likely to continue the habit as they age, a new study shows.
How to be happy: Aristotle’s 11 guidelines for a good life
In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle proposed that humans are social, rational animals who seek to “live well.”
Procrastinating is linked to health and career problems – but here’s how you can stop
In the long run, procrastination isn’t an effective way of managing emotions and causes health and work setbacks.
Six benefits that the metaverse offers to colleges and universities
Colleges and universities are keen to jump on the metaverse bandwagon, even before knowing what the metaverse really is.
To make great changes in your life, follow the philosophy of kaizen
Kaizen asks us to make small changes, slowly and over time. It's a hard skill to master in an age of instant gratification.
New industries are embracing apprenticeships
Eschewing costly college degrees, earn-and-learn apprenticeship programs are pushing into new industries.
Mathematicians suggest the “37% rule” for life’s biggest decisions
Mathematicians tell us that, to maximize the chances of the best outcome, we ought to ditch the first 37% of any options.
How these schools create problem-solving optimists
In partnership with Higher Ground
Solving the world’s greatest problems starts in one place: educating the leaders of tomorrow. This school is planning to do just that.
People who read live longer than those who don’t, Yale researchers say
A study by Yale researchers finds that reading books in particular returns cognitive gains that increase longevity.
Winners announced: $50K Beautiful Minds competition on innovating higher ed
In partnership with Lumina
Each organization is helping people to prepare for and succeed in our fast-changing world.
Google Career Certificate programs are now free for US businesses
Google has announced a new Career Certificate program and a plan to give any US business $100,000 in free tech training.
Are colleges necessary?
Student debt, sticker price, a pandemic, and economic uncertainty has Gen Z rethinking education.
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Catalysts
This school without grades or homework has a 98% college acceptance rate
In partnership with Stand Together
No homework. Grades you can change. This school is challenging everything about our approach to education - and it’s working with a 98% college acceptance rate.
Traditional colleges are recognizing Google career certificates
Google career certificates are now being accepted for college credit at some universities, helping students obtain degrees more cheaply.
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Catalysts
How to get your kid the best teachers from anywhere in the world
In partnership with Stand Together
This Grammy winner has written songs for Beyoncé, Aretha Franklin, and Whitney Houston. Now, he wants to teach your kids online, thanks to Outschool.
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Catalysts
Beyond the classroom: Outschool gives kids the chance to follow their dreams
In partnership with Stand Together
Watch 13-year-old Isaac’s dreams come true with a heartwarming surprise from the Stand Together community and a Dallas Cowboys legend.
Could Gen Z close the racial wealth gap through entrepreneurship?
In partnership with Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation
This American city was ranked one of the worst for the success of black-owned businesses. Can these young entrepreneurs change that?
Beyond Sunday Service: How one Montgomery church is bringing health equity to their community
In partnership with Chan Zuckerberg Initiative
A grassroots approach to vaccine education is happening in the heart of the civil rights movement in Alabama. Does this church hold the key to overcoming medical mistrust?
“The Blob,” a strangely intelligent slime mold, is going to space
A strange slime mold that can think despite lacking a brain is heading to the ISS as part of an educational experiment with French schools.
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Catalysts
Is our K-12 education system limiting human potential?
In partnership with Stand Together
Our K-12 education system is centered around the assumption that every student learns and masters material the exact same way. The problem is: they don’t.
Flickering screens help kids with reading disabilities
Adding visual white noise to computer screens appears to help children with reading disabilities read and recall words written on them.
Experts say education coming to the VR world is going to be “absolutely incredible”
Because of the pandemic educators are looking for more remote learning options and discovering the benefits of virtual reality.
Engageli challenges Zoom for best virtual classroom
Engageli, a new digital education platform launched this week, to provide a solution to remote learning woes.
A professor's teaching hack lights up twitter
Educators new to online teaching are struggling to adapt. This teacher created a DIY lightboard that is being widely shared on Twitter.
Google announces cheaper alternatives to college degrees
Google’s new certificate program provides alternatives to college degrees that are cheaper to obtain, but potentially worth the same in the job market.
Nerve-stimulating earbud could accelerate language learning
A non-invasive vagus nerve stimulation device can make language learning easier — and it might help with other types of learning, too.
Doctors need to learn what illnesses look like on darker skin
Medical student Malone Mukwende wrote a book to teach others how to spot clinical signs of illness on patients with darker skin tones.
The case for teaching students outside this fall
Transitioning to outdoor classrooms this fall could help stem the spread of COVID-19 in schools and protect students, according to researchers.
Reopening schools this fall could benefit children
Experts in favor of reopening schools as soon as possible argue that school closures could be hurting young people’s physical, mental, and social health.
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Challengers
Preschool is broken. Silicon Valley is fixing the system.
Wonderschool is empowering educators to offer affordable, private preschool classes from their homes, making early childhood education more accessible to every child.
Ventilators, vaccines, and drag queens
We believe the news doesn’t have to be depressing. In fact, it should inspire people to build a better world. Watch the first episode of our new series, Progress Report.
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Catalysts
Learning to code in prison
In partnership with Stand Together
This progressive organization is on a mission to break the cycle of recidivism, using coding. Incarcerated individuals can now spend their sentences acquiring marketable skills.
New to homeschooling? here are 5 resources that can help
Here are five online resources for the first-time homeschooler, from foreign language classes to physical education.
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Catalysts
Open source textbooks save students $1 billion
In partnership with Stand Together
Many college students’ ability to realize their full potential is hampered by insurmountable expenses, so OpenStax is turning the tide by providing access to free textbooks.
Chance the Rapper is bringing music back to Chicago schools
On the far South Side of Chicago, as far south as you can get — a traffic light away from neighboring Riverdale —...
Legal pot is finally growing up and going to college
As medical marijuana becomes mainstream, so does the need for an educated workforce in the industry. Enter the nation's first-ever cannabis degree program.
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Catalysts
Turning a construction site into a classroom
In partnership with Stand Together
unCommon Construction offers a unique alternative to your typical internship for high school students. Their program turns build sites into real-world classrooms where interns learn the soft skills they’ll need to succeed in the workforce.
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Catalysts
Earning college degrees in prison
In partnership with Stand Together
In the midst of his prison sentence for murder, Sean Pica helped found Hudson Link - an organization dedicated to reducing recidivism and improving lives through higher education.
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Dope Science
The Drug Users Bible: A guide to safe drug use
Over a 10 year period, Dominic Milton Trott self-administered 157 psychoactive drugs and documented his experiences on each one. He then created the book, The Drug Users Bible, to inform curious minds about safe drug use.
How to drive student engagement? Unleash a swarm.
Our favorite principal, Hamish Brewer, is up to something new this school year. Just like Hogwarts, his school is adopting the traditional house system to improve academic performance, student engagement, and behavior.
Nature is good for you. What about VR nature?
Nature has the power to reduce stress and enhance our moods. Can VR nature experiences be a substitute for physically spending time in the outdoors?
Robots for autism teach human emotion
Meet the classroom assistant of the future, a robot for autism therapy that’s teaching special needs students about empathy and emotions.
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Catalysts
The mental health movement for Chicago’s inner city youth
In partnership with Stand Together
A remarkable transformation is taking place in several inner-city Chicago schools, and it's resulting in fewer gangs, drugs, and homicides. Could this new model of group therapy be the cause, and is it scalable?
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Catalysts
A school made for homeless children
In partnership with Stand Together
When a child faces chaos at home, it's impossible to learn. This school is doing whatever it takes to help homeless students and their families create better lives.
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Catalysts
The lost art of apprenticeship
In partnership with Stand Together
After his dad died, he struggled in high school and ended up getting a DUI. Stuck in dead-end jobs, he responded to a nonprofit’s post for free skilled labor training - and his whole life changed.
How this non-profit weaves a family of support for struggling teens in Baltimore
“Everyone - no matter their age, race, or background - needs a network of supportive relationships to help them...
The joy of being wrong
In partnership with John Templeton Foundation
Can practicing intellectual humility make us smarter and happier? Science says yes.
How to teach kids to read in as little as 50 days
In partnership with Skoll Foundation
1 in 10 people in the world today are illiterate. This program teaches people to read in as little as 50 days.
This fearless principal used UFC & skateboards to save a failing school
How one relentless, unconventional principal rallied an underdog school.
Science funding is wasting young careers. Here's how to fix it.
Basic science funding is a mess. Fixing it could radically improve the pace of innovation.
Prison education can break the "revolving door" of recidivism
Over 600,000 people will leave prison this year; here's how we can help them never return.
Teaching engineering with dirt bikes
This teacher is using dirt bikes to help Baltimore's kids learn STEM.
The tattooed, skater principal making education fun again
The Tattooed, Skater Principal Making Education Fun Again
Five insights from AltSchool founder and CEO, Max Ventilla
Max Ventilla on why he thinks its time for a new way to educate kids and how his startup could be a way to do it.
Can this startup build the school system of the future?
AltSchool wants to build a new school system based on a highly personalized education model that any school could...
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Challengers
Building a better school system
A highly-personalized experience could be the foundation for the future of education.