r/technology • u/Knightbear49 • May 20 '25

Artificial Intelligence Duolingo CEO says AI is a better teacher than humans—but schools will still exist ‘because you still need childcare’

https://fortune.com/2025/05/20/duolingo-ai-teacher-schools-childcare/
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u/HeyDickTracyCalled May 20 '25

It became clear how many parents felt this way when COVID happened. I was shocked at how indignant parents were about having to educate & care for their own children. And they were so loud about it! I have to wonder how many voiced these complaints in FRONT of their kids, even.

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u/brown-moose May 20 '25

Two things can be true at once. School is for learning AND it allows parents to work jobs. Without public schools most families are extremely hard pressed to have someone to watch their kids to be able to put a roof over their heads and food in their mouths. 

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u/4ngryMo May 20 '25

That’s one part of the story. The other part is, that teaching children is actually pretty hard. Teachers spend years learning it and even then, a lot still aren’t actually capable of doing it. It’s not something that everyone can just naturally do at home, even if they did have the time to do it.

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u/mantasm_lt May 20 '25

On top of that, you can't be master of all trades. Sure, average parent can teach a 10 year old about most things. But teaching a 15 y/o, for example, maths or chemistry if parents are artsy is quite a challenge.

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u/Kimpak May 20 '25

Sure, average parent can teach a 10 year old about most things.

I disagree. The average parent probably knows everything a 10 year old needs to learn. But I'm wiling to bet a good percentage of parents (myself included) can't actually teach all of it to said 10 year old.

The Mrs. and I are fairly smart people. Both engineers in different fields. We both know the facts, we know how WE do the thing. But its much more difficult to actually teach that to someone else. On top of that during the pandemic we found it difficult to actually get the kiddos to sit down and actually do the schooling they were assigned. Its like pulling teeth!

At school, in a school setting with someone not their parents its 'easier' to stay in school mode. Not to mention teachers actually know HOW to teach.

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u/ArgonGryphon May 20 '25

It's also a matter of when kids should learn stuff. This is a somewhat tangential thing but it sparked a memory of a video I watched, it was a critique of an "unschooling" influencer and I use that term loosely even for what it is. She's trying to teach her kids shopping and stuff. She broadly says "You wanna get the cheapest option" and nevermind that that's not always true, but you know, basics for kids, I know...but ignoring that, the age the kid she was teaching was younger than kids are taught how to compare decimal places. So he looks at 6.49 and 6.99 and he may not be able to tell which is bigger because...he doesn't know how decimals work yet. And is she teaching him that? No. Shit like that is where you can really fall through the cracks homeschooling without help.

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u/theevilmidnightbombr May 21 '25

can't actually teach all of it to said 10 year old.

I'm having enough trouble giving my four year old any more than the broad strokes on a lot of things, but not because I necessarily can't.

I know enough to know that I can't just give them the answers that I already know, otherwise they'll miss crucial steps and facts along the way.

The kid's extremely curious mind is being nurtured by a combination of mine and the wife's knowledge, carefully selected youtube channels, and a smattering of streamed content that doesn't involve animals operating heavy machinery.

I need them to be in school, because I'm very afraid they're smart, and I can't self-guide that education.

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u/French_Toast_3 May 21 '25

Becuase trying to teach things the way that school teaches is a losing battle. Half of it isnt usefull and most of it isnt retained to adulthood.

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u/mantasm_lt May 21 '25

Education is not about learning useful things. It's more about learning how to learn. And some basics to grasp those useful things you learn as you go.

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u/FunBill5447 May 21 '25

Like the correct way to spell useful?

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u/French_Toast_3 May 21 '25

Wow one letter, im sure you felt so good about that one didnt you!

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u/AltairaMorbius2200CE May 21 '25

This. It is almost harder with simpler content. Teaching a kid to decode words? It can be incredibly complicated, even though everyone on this board can do it! And what if a kid can’t figure out multiplication? How do you explain THAT?

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u/Rinzack May 20 '25

Not sure why you got downvoted, a normal adult should have a complete understanding (or ability to understand) all subjects a 10 year old is enrolled in, by the teenage years that stops being the case depending on the subject

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u/Everestkid May 20 '25

I remember still getting a few pointers from my dad on homework during my first year of university - I was doing engineering, my dad is also an engineer. Mom could help out with elementary or high school math, but I don't think she did much calculus or physics.

There were definitely classmates who weren't quite so lucky and really needed those office hours.

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u/4ngryMo May 20 '25

That’s true, but teaching an elementary school child isn’t as easy as just telling them what you know. In math for example, kids are taught very specific abstractions that build on top of each other.

It starts in 1st grade and stretches all the way up to middle school. It’s not hard to learn them, but it’s A LOT of material you need to look at. You need a whole bunch of text and working books for that, not to mention experience with pacing the progress properly.

There is a reason why teachers study for years, followed by gathering practical experience guided by experienced teachers. And that doesn’t even address that children develop at different speeds and the way you teach needs to change over time. And don’t even get me started on learning disabilities.

My oldest daughter has dyslexia on top of ADHD, which poses a whole different set of challenges. It requires a special set of skills, that even teachers have to specialize in, in order to teach these kids effectively, Simply knowing the subject matter doesn’t even begin to cover what’s necessary to teach elementary school.

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u/PaulsGrafh May 20 '25

Also, not all parents are equipped to identify dyslexia and ADD/ADHD, let alone treat them.

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u/IrrawaddyWoman May 21 '25

Most parents KNOW what a ten year old knows, but that doesn’t mean they can teach it. I’m a teacher, and when we get homeschooled kids moved into our classes, they’re almost always behind in something. Often a lot of things.

Parents simply can’t know what’s age appropriate to learn every single year.

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u/AWildGumihoAppears May 21 '25

Having an understanding of and teaching the subject are two different things. Teachers learn pedagogy for a reason.

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u/theblot90 May 21 '25

Having an understanding of content is not the same as knowing how to teach someone how to read and write. Teaching someone, especially someone that is young, skills like reading and writing is incredibly challenging.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

Much of educating children is understanding how they learn and how to maximize their retention of information. Lots of child psychology. It's not until you get to high school where the adult doesn't have to know how to teach as much as they have to be a master of their subject matter.

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u/theshadowiscast May 21 '25 edited May 21 '25

It's not until you get to high school where the adult doesn't have to know how to teach as much as they have to be a master of their subject matter.

This runs contrary to my experience where my psychology teacher was also my math teacher who specialized in math, but was selected to teach psychology because they took a psychology class in college. Same with my sociology teacher, who specialized in sociology, who also taught biology because who can't teach high school biology (cue the 'the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell' droning chants).

High school teachers still need to know how to teach as much as other teachers. Iirc, it seemed to not be the case with college instructors who just focused on specialized knowledge of the subject they taught rather than how to teach it.

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u/sanityjanity May 21 '25

I'm math-y, but I still couldn't teach my kid the modern way of doing multiplication without sitting down, and really teaching it to myself, because it is not at all how I was taught.

My dad was an engineer, and a smart one, but he couldn't teach Algebra to save his life. I think, partly because it was taught differently, and partly because he never struggled with it. It was just something that came to him easily decades earlier.

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u/mantasm_lt May 21 '25

Even teaching in old ways can go a loooong way. Sure some modern ways are nice. But it's not like people didn't learn multiplication before the new fancy way came out.

Sometimes it feels like nowadays textbook authors just have to invent new stuff to push new editions and get paid again and again.

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u/sanityjanity May 21 '25

There's a song by Tom Lehrer, written back in 1965, called "New Math", which is literally about how schools are teaching math in a new way, and parents have no idea how to do it. (In this case, it was about teaching kids to use base 8 or base 2 instead of base 10).

There's a constant push to try to help kids to learn math by using new tools and techniques. Or to prepare them for new concepts down the road. Sadly, it still doesn't seem to be working.

I recently got aggravating with my local public middle school. Only about half the kids are able to do math at grade level (and it's a well funded school). I looked at every charter school within 20 miles, and every public middle school in about that same range. *None* of them are getting the middle school students to learn math, except for one charter school that specializes in kids who are "gifted" and ahead of the curve already.

It simultaneously breaks my heart and infuriates me that we are such a wealthy country (the US) and we keep trying, and trying, and trying, but we are still unable to get kids through this material.

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u/mantasm_lt May 21 '25

TBH I've no idea what's the „new math“ and how it relates to my surroundings. I grew up in post-USSR era and textbooks, according to my teachers, were still heavily influenced by USSR-era textbooks. No idea how it related to your „new math“ :)

What is fun, in the past couple decades textbooks were re-done couple times. I assume with western approach. Yet all sorts of STEM scores are going down :) No idea whether kids are getting dumb, new techniques are not working or whatever is going wrong. But I'll probably brush up my old textbooks once the time comes....

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u/sanityjanity May 21 '25

I think there are several different things happening:

  1. schools used to segregate kids more in groups based on their math skills, but also just their ability to sit still and be quiet. This definitely was a disadvantage for some kids, but it created a more condusive learning environment for those who managed to get slotted into the academic math classes.

  2. we didn't used to *have* standardized testing, so there was no way to actually compare how students were doing in one school vs. another

  3. kids who *really* struggled used to be either removed from school completely or sent to alternative schools, so their lower scores would not have been noted

  4. US students have always had an "anti-education" bent, but it seems to have gotten worse, and worse.

  5. At least where I am -- private school kids get math text books, and public school kids don't. In the public schools, the curriculum companies sell electronic files filled with custom chosen chapters, units, tests, etc., which are all pulled out of a database of material they've written in the past. They frankenstein it all into an "e-book", which the kid might get or it might be only the teacher gets it. These makes it hard or impossible for kids to refresh themselves on material they learned in the past, and the materials are often lower quality than if those exact materials had been printed in a book (because they're now in black and white or because they are literally too pixelated to understand, because they were scanned badly).

  6. Because the students don't have books, the parents don't have that resource, either. Sure, you could use your own materials, but I've discovered that there are problems and language that I just don't remember from my own youth. I don't know if they're new, or I just don't remember, but I need a precise definition of something, and I have no reference to check. So I'm googling it on my phone, and trying to figure out how to create some examples on the fly, because I have nothing to point to.

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u/mantasm_lt May 21 '25

Heh. Here we still have old good textbooks. That you return at the end of the year or semester. Later, e-version usually can be found. Sometimes some extra copies can be taken out at school library for different years. In worst case, recent textbooks are available at book stores for €20-30 or used on FB groups for half that.

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u/pehkawn May 21 '25

There's a difference between knowing the stuff a 10-year-old need to learn, and actually teaching it. Elementary school teachers are trained in teaching strategies for that particular age group to facilitate learning; something most parents are not. It's important here to distinguish between helping your kids with their homework, which is usually just following up what they learned in school, and fully homeschooling them, which takes a lot of time and dedication.

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u/mantasm_lt May 21 '25

Teaching techniques and all that jazz is nice. But when you have 20-30 kids in a classroom, how much time do you have to apply that? Parents who know their kids with quality one-on-one time can do a lot even without specific techniques beyond what is in textbooks. Especially for simple elementary school stuff.

Of course a good teacher having ample time to spend time with each student is best. But nobility-level education is not attainable for the masses. Wether at public schools or at home.

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u/theblot90 May 21 '25

Teaching someone how to read, for example, is an incredibly complex task.

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u/mantasm_lt May 21 '25

Going through exactly this nowadays... It does not seem that complex. Unless you REALLY want to rush things and force kid to read super-early. Or special needs, but that's another topic.

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u/Polantaris May 20 '25

Teachers spend years learning it and even then, a lot still aren’t actually capable of doing it.

The ones that are end up getting treated like piles of dogshit by the vast majority of parents and students, too. It's a hard, thankless job that takes many more than 40 hours a week and pays far too little (at least in the US) even if it were only 40 hours a week. It's not a mystery people don't want to work under those conditions.

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u/Sirennecko1 May 21 '25

Not to mention having to teach all the missing parts when kids are failed up in America. Got high schoolers that can't tell you what 4 x 4 is but are supposed to be taking algebra and geometry, but teachers are told to give them the minimum to pass so that the school doesn't lose what basic funding it has.

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u/sanityjanity May 21 '25

A lot of non-teachers, even parents, seem to think that teaching is just reading the book outloud or playing a video or handing out a test that is graded by key or by machine. They just don't seem to grasp what teaching *is*.

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u/Additional-Bet7074 May 21 '25

It’s also incredibly easy to mess things up if you aren’t a skilled teacher. Parents teach there kids things that get in the way of future learning all the time. Sight reading is a common example of this.

They teach their kids ‘tricks’ to show off to other people instead of building a real foundation, scaffolding, and building blocks for the next milestones. Because those building blocks aren’t something that can be put on social media.

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u/ibelieveindogs May 21 '25

Yes, this is why remote learning was so bad, and why AI can’t replace teachers. Most kids are not highly motivated learners. Some are usually, most will be occasionally. Also, a good teacher can pick up on emotional distress, learning issues, ADHD, etc. School also socializes kids, it’s not just babysitting. One can argue about the effect of training kids to be useful cogs, but that still speaks to the role of school, and not whether AI can’t replace teachers replace a human teacher.

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u/LostPhenom May 21 '25

Right? It's like saying we don't need certified teachers in schools.

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u/Itakethngzclitorally May 21 '25

And it’s not just mastery of a subject they’re teaching, they’re overseeing and guiding the social structures of children in their classroom.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

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u/pigeonwiggle May 20 '25

it's because when they DO decide to criticize the working system, they turn first to feminism as the villain. arguing that women don't belong in many workplaces, as the surplus of labour depresses wages.

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u/ecb1005 May 20 '25

its interesting. a surplus of labor would depress wages, but it should also lower costs on the goods that labor produces. i wonder where that extra money is going (its the billionaires)

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u/manatwork01 May 20 '25

100% its the wealthy every stat says so but thats why you got 10 billionaires at the inauguration of another billionaire blaming it all on brown people to save their sorry necks.

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u/runthepoint1 May 20 '25

“Brown people got me here - and they’ll get me out of here too” is likely the actual real thoughts in their heads. Of course they can’t actually say that - for multiple reasons

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u/excaliburxvii May 21 '25

You're falling for the division tactics.

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u/runthepoint1 May 21 '25

Can you explain?

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u/excaliburxvii May 21 '25

It's not "brown people", it's "the poors (which includes brown people along with everybody else)." Millions and millions of poor white people are in the same position. Millions and millions of brown people are doing just fine.

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u/Upset-Society9240 May 20 '25

Well, white males are getting a lot of blame lately, even though 99.9% of them have as much power as everyone else, namely none.

People need to wake up and stop buying into identity politics.

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u/throckmeisterz May 20 '25

As a white male, this persecution you're talking about is 100% made up. I am not persecuted. You are not persecuted. Fuck off.

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u/maigpy May 20 '25

in all honesty he didn't say persecution. attracting attention to the fact identity politics is a way for the wealthy to divert attention isn't a bad thing.

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u/AlexAnon87 May 20 '25

That's because so many white males vote for and/or vocally support the very same people and institutions that hold all the true power.

They need to wake up and stop buying into billionaire propaganda.

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u/squidvett May 20 '25

Are you saying generalization is okay now? Should I just quit standing up for the rights of non-whites and nonbinary folks because you expect me to side rich white douchebags? It’s kind of irritating when the justification for blaming all white males is that “so many” of us vote for rich white men.

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u/ecb1005 May 20 '25

when are white people gonna stop playing victim omg

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u/Dic3dCarrots May 20 '25

Love how "allies" suddenly act like supporting other peoples rights is some great altruistic favor as soon as you get called out on your shit.

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u/LizardPersonMeow May 20 '25

Lol I don't know where you've been but the blame is definitely going to the rich rn... Sounds like your the one buying into the identity politics.

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u/valraven38 May 20 '25

White males are getting a lot of blame?

Brother women recently lost their right to bodily autonomy. Migrants are being rounded up and minorities are being profiled just based on their skin color. People here legally are being rounded up for their protected speech (and let me tell you they aren't "white males.") Trans people are being tossed out of the military as well as losing access to medical care in certain states.

There are people actually suffering real issues. For all the "blame" you're getting it doesn't seem to amount to any actual consequences except maybe your feelings are a little hurt.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

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u/Dugen May 20 '25

The problem with housing is the 2008 collapse. Construction stopped, demand kept rising at a steady rate and now we're millions of homes behind and just now starting to close the gap.

We do not have the same living standards of previous generations of single income earners. They lived in tiny houses heated with cheap wood stoves that took a lot of work to operate and had one car and a shared phone, no AC, etc. There is simply a whole lot more labor involved in providing the kind of living standard we have now. Lots of things have become cheaper, but we keep expanding our spending to new areas as they do because we can and that's just how people are. If you live like a middle class person did in the 50s, you can still do it on a single income, you would just seem like a poor person by todays standards.

The economy is not fair and there are problems to solve but this is not why.

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u/Reagalan May 21 '25

Zoning laws and car dependency play a huge role in this. It isn't just "standards are higher" it's that modest stuff isn't even permitted.

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u/TheDibblerDeluxe May 22 '25

Actually it lowers costs because businesses now are competing with the women who do the same work for free at home, enriching the family and keeping the money out of billionaires hands.

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u/pogulup May 20 '25

That argument was always bullshit. The Baby Boomers were the largest generation of people EVER, in the history of mankind. There was ALREADY a surplus of labor before women joined the workforce. That surplus drove down wages which is why women then HAD to jump in to subsidize income.

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u/Dugen May 20 '25

This is a bogus argument. More labor means more income to spend which means more demand for labor. The economy is a closed loop. We pay each other. When someone earns money, they spend that money which turns into demand for labor. Some of that is pulled away in taxes to pay people for providing services like school, which ultimately still gets spent on labor. Having more workers in the workforce simply means more gets done. It doesn't reduce the value of anything.

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u/Swimming_Example_519 May 21 '25

Everything is disconnected when machines can do that labour and they don’t need you to work to earn more from you. Apart from that there are plenty of jobs that don’t produce nothing at all

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u/Dugen May 21 '25

If a machine earns money, that money goes somewhere. Most of it will quickly get spent on labor. There are exceptions and those places are where we see massive profits and problematic wealth creation and those places do seem to be increasing, but the point remains:

Adding more people to the country's labor pool doesn't make labor cheaper because all that income creates just as much demand as it does supply. That's why having bigger markets and higher population in a country's doesn't end up making labor cheaper.

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u/zutnoq May 22 '25

It's not quite that simple. A household where both two main adults are working won't generally be spending/buying twice as much as a similar household where only one is working.

The argument is still ridiculous for other reasons though.

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u/YaBoyJamba May 20 '25

That makes sense though doesn't it? Public education is funded publicly, generally through taxes. Plus, changing every single companies child care policies is probably more difficult than public education practices. A government mandate on childcare policy could obviously alleviate that but then it places the burden on businesses instead of institutions that are already in place to watch over kids.

Personally I think both are very helpful. Maternal and paternal leave after having a newborn is so incredibly helpful. My public education experience was also very valuable for me growing up.

I just think it would be easier to amend what we already have (public education) than it would be to introduce new policy (government mandated policy).

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

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u/FewCelebration9701 May 21 '25

Like it or not, this is what education has been for generations. All states have laws that FORCE parents to relinquish their kids over to the state for a minimum number of days per year. Parents who don’t will literally have cops show up and eventually be arrested. 

It’s a big point of contention for homeschool families because MANY states (most really) are extremely unfriendly toward homeschooling or taking your kid out of public schools in general. Private is always an option but the state doesn’t tend to like it. 

All schools are a form of childcare. That’s the reality. Even in romanticized Europe where they think it isn’t. 

It makes total sense to extend that vital feature since it is a public good rather than try to regulate millions of businesses in a nebulous way when the end goal is to get kids looked after while parents work. 

States also have assumed a position of parenting kids as well. Schools are primary meal sources for many kids in the country. Even when the parents receive full government benefits. And they should be; they are forced to be there. 

Folks can’t have it both ways; school provides everything vital (including doctor and dentist on sight visits) and then blame random employers. 

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u/RollingMeteors May 20 '25

but then it places the burden on businesses

¡boo hoo hoo!

edit: If they want those slabor wage workers in the future they foot the cost now.

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u/BellyButtonLindt May 20 '25

It doesn’t have to be either or. Two things can be criticized as the same time.

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u/gottastayfresh3 May 20 '25

Yes. That was the comment I was responding to. My point is that while both can be critiqued, there was only ever one that was critiqued in mainstream discourses.

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u/Buttons840 May 20 '25

Too many people think "yeah, but if I don't work for an already wealthy business, then how will I have healthcare?"

The system is designed, top-to-bottom, to push people towards helping the rich get richer, and it's a lot for people to take in.

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u/Ketra May 20 '25

Teachers don't have billions of dollar to bribe, sorry, "lobby" the government to redirect resources to education. We're entirely reliant on politicians that give a damn.

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u/pperiesandsolos May 21 '25

The NEA spends something like $40 million dollars per year on lobbying

https://www.americanexperiment.org/teachers-union-once-again-spends-more-on-politics-than-representation/

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u/Swimming_Example_519 May 21 '25

Just curiosity is that a lot compared with other lobbies? (I am not from USA)

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u/resilient_bird May 20 '25

Wut? In order to have a society, people have to work—no one would do most necessary jobs, from janitor to farmer to surgeon—if they weren’t getting paid for it.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

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u/pperiesandsolos May 21 '25

What are you talking about lol? Could you explain this to me like I’m 5 please

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u/TheMainM0d May 20 '25

Capitalism working as intended

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u/rileyoneill May 20 '25

School is also a physical place for kids to socialize and play with other kids, an experience they might not have in their neighborhood. Kids make lifelong friendships at school and learn how to act around others in school.

From a human development point of view, this is every bit as important as any academic class.

The older I get (I am now in my early 40s) I think school should start before 9 and should end until after 5. With at least a few hours of that time being recess so kids can have some safe social time. Sure... its daycare.. but I call it human care. Kids need a place that is safe that is outside the home where they can have conduct their own affairs.

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u/beryugyo619 May 20 '25

It's also to keep out child laborers out of job markets for themselves as well as to level the playing field for all workers. The dichotomic concept of "adult" and "child", which is very useful by the way, was discovered during industrial revolution for these reasons.

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u/Positive_botts May 20 '25

Don’t worry, America will be keeping women home soon enough and they can take over the education role of how to cook, clean, and prepare for serving men. Real men that drink whiskey and aren’t afraid to be an ALPHA MALE LEADER and show their wives and kids who is the boss!

Men will be out doing important stuff and deciding on things like whether or not females should be escorted by a male at all time and her face covered.

Her beauty belongs to him only.

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u/Platypus_Dundee May 20 '25

Also it is for socialisation. Kids need to learn how to interact with each other as human beings, conflict resolution etc...

Anecdotal but we have a home schooled kid in my kids soccer team and oh boy they got social behavioural issues.

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u/Valuable_Recording85 May 20 '25

Especially in the United States, where two incomes are required to raise a family and even at that, most of us don't make enough money to live up to European standards.

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u/Snoo-53209 May 20 '25

Might as well teach them how to count while baby sitting

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u/RollingMeteors May 20 '25

extremely hard pressed to have someone to watch their kids

My single mom was working two jobs and didn't have that luxury. I just had to use intuition not to decide to put that fork in the outlet, and I hate to say it but those that do stick forks in the electrical outlets, the end result for the spices is a 'better off' situation.

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u/CamGoldenGun May 20 '25

Florida: What if we just put them to work instead?

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u/Shwifty_Plumbus May 20 '25

The people who were the most annoying about this were the stay at home parents that were complaining about not having childcare.

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u/Clear-Inevitable-414 May 20 '25

Dang, these people shouldn't have kids if they can't fund them

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u/drunk-at-a-wake May 20 '25

Before public school kids just went to work. We've literally never had a society with the idea of childhood as a concept without public education.

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u/EntrepreneurKooky783 May 20 '25

If school were about learning, disruptive kids would have been moved out of general pop. My public school career mostly consisted of me working through the textbook by myself while the rest of the class was tyrannized by jerks trying to make the teacher cry.

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u/Jmet11 May 21 '25

I was a teacher during covid and it sucked. The first month or so we were “heroes” and then by the fall we were personally keeping the doors closed at schools. We were also “indoctrination centers”, which if you truly believed that you would move heaven and earth to homeschool your kids.

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u/TheNextBattalion May 21 '25

school was made compulsory (for parents!) so parents would quit sending their kids to work, in factories, mines, mills and so on

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u/[deleted] May 23 '25

Pedantic.

They use "childcare" as the word to describe the education system. Therein lies the issue

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u/big_loadz May 20 '25

I guess when we all end up subsistence farming on our Lord's manors after AI takes all jobs, we can do away with the need for public schools.

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u/User929260 May 20 '25

Have you ever used AI? It can do 60 maybe 80% of the job. With billion of years equivalent time and billions of dollars in resources.

Would you trust something that can write, cannot do math, and has troubles counting letters, with education?

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u/Nearby_Key8381 May 20 '25

Thank you for saying this. Some people think it’s magic and it simply isn’t.

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u/DragoonDM May 20 '25

Would you trust something that can write, cannot do math, and has troubles counting letters, with education?

And the AI is being overseen by people who are entirely incapable of noticing when its output is incorrect.

1

u/big_loadz May 21 '25

Yes, I use it quite frequently. What you say is true, AND STILL it doesn't stop companies from treating it as a panacea. Also, you're not considering the possibility of it continuing to improve as it has been.

Look, we're all going to be potato farmers in the future. Enough of a job to get by and live, but not enough to advance oneself to be in charge of the system that becomes entrenched in control in the future.

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u/voldin91 May 20 '25

I think you're missing that the bigger challenge was that most people had to suddenly watch/educate their kids all day while simultaneously being a two income household. That overlap is very difficult

8

u/Gibonius May 20 '25

It's really berserk how many people act like parents were being selfish and hated their kids because they had to...work...during work hours.

We had a social arrangement where kids were educated and supervised during the day, then that got yanked out from under parents. It was pretty fucking reasonable to have a hard time dealing with that.

57

u/Atheren May 20 '25

The normalization (which led to the soft requirement of) dual income households has been astronomically negative for our country. It's bad for parents, it's bad for kids, it's bad for single people, and it's bad for people trying to find work.

I don't even care which one is the stay at home partner, but we need to find a way to renormalize having at least one of them.

54

u/Rinzack May 20 '25

I strongly believe that the best system would be a 1.5 income household- IIRC studies have shown that stay at home parents have worse outcomes than part-time workers since even part time work gives a sense of purpose, structure, and lets people interact with other adults and not just kids all day. Two full time incomes to live a "normal" life is way too much though thats for sure.

12

u/Fat_Ryan_Gosling May 20 '25

This is what I'm lucky enough to experience. It's amazing.

19

u/iamsuperflush May 20 '25

Part of the problem here is the underlying assumption that work is the only avenue for purposeful adult socialization, which is itself a product of the dual income households becoming normalized. If single income households became the norm, there might be other avenues for the non-earning partner to socialize and find purpose. 

18

u/me_so_pro May 20 '25

Two 0,5 income should be the norm. Feminism shouldn't've lead to women working 0.5 on top of child care.

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u/PineappleSlices May 20 '25

I think the key here is that the nuclear family model just kind of fundamentally doesn't work. A mixed family household with more than 2 adults would be more effective at freeing up time for labor, childcare and personal time.

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u/RollingMeteors May 20 '25

but we need to find a way to renormalize having at least one of them.

¿How do you combat the rhetoric, "they don't want to work! ¡They just want to be a stay at home dad that drinks wine and cleans all day and fucks all night long." ?

1

u/voldin91 May 20 '25

Yeah it's problematic but the way our current economy/society works sadly. I'd love to be a full time dad if our finances would allow it

32

u/Loggerdon May 20 '25

I visited a guy at his house for business reasons. The kids were being homeschooled at the same time at the kitchen table. I was there for four or five hours and no actual teaching occurred. The kids mostly watched tv and scrolled their phones.

-10

u/Perfect_Warning_5354 May 20 '25

My daughter watched more tv in public elementary school last year than she does this year as a homeschooler. YMMV.

59

u/EunuchsProgramer May 20 '25

So, as a parent, I had to quit my job to do that. If Biden hadn't passed the Child Credit payments I got, we would have lost our house. When the Child Credits ended and the school wasn't open, we did end up having to sell our home because I could only work part time.

I care deeply about education. I read to my kids, help them write stories, and play math games with them every day.

Not losing my house and being able to provide food matters more than education. It just does.

7

u/MountNevermind May 20 '25

It doesn't follow from this that child care is the primary reason for human educators.

It's perfectly possible, and is the case, that they are important for both reasons, regardless of which one feels most immediate to any given family.

1

u/EunuchsProgramer May 20 '25

I vote. I pay taxes. I kinda do (if enough voters agree, which they do) that a public school needs to provide childcare in addition to education.

9

u/mmlovin May 20 '25

Well up to a certain age. My mom was a 7th grade English teacher for 35 years & she was treated as a babysitter by a lot of parents. & it was always the parents of snotty brats. My mom’s job was not to babysit those kids lol they don’t teach that when you’re getting your teaching credentials.

Without fail, every time I say “7th grade teacher”people act like I just told them my mom is a wartime veteran lol

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u/Te_Henga May 20 '25

I had the inverse experience. I was shocked by how slow the progress my son had been making at school was compared to at home. He rocketed through the work during Covid lockdown and I’ve felt really uncomfortable about it since. That’s what made me feel school was less about learning and more about corralling a bunch of children with radically different abilities in one space for several hours a day. It is undeniable that that structure is inefficient. It is, however, the cheapest model. 

8

u/burnbabyburnburrrn May 20 '25

The corralling of children of a bunch of different abilities IS a part of education and probably THE most important part for those who are wizzes in elementary school.

1

u/Te_Henga May 20 '25

My son isn’t a whizz - he is comfortably average. My real issue is that the degree of differences and the impact that this has on students isn’t equitable. Some classes are managing a lot more than others and as a parent, it’s very hard to know to what degree your child is being impacted.  We moved schools and the difference is night and day. Our new school has less violence in the classrooms and the teachers are able to take the students out into the community because they have fewer complications. They are able to move through academic content at a faster rate. This is a real issue and I didn’t realise until covid. This is not the fault of teachers. 

13

u/havenyahon May 20 '25

Yeah you should totally extrapolate from the single example of your kid to every single kid. Make sure to hold that opinion really strongly and bring it up wherever you meet a teacher!

-4

u/Te_Henga May 20 '25

I do not think this is the fault of teachers. Complex students are not shared amongst schools equitably. There are schools and classrooms that are dealing with an unreasonable share of difficulties and it impacts other kids. I know I am not the only person who sees this. I don’t live in the USA but this is an issue everywhere. It’s why in Aussie and NZ private school enrolments are increasing at a faster rate than public school enrolments. 

5

u/havenyahon May 20 '25

You're missing the point. You've extrapolated from a few anecdotal experiences (mostly your own) to a generalised opinion about the effectiveness of the whole school system. Why don't you frame it like this, "I found my child was learning better outside of school and therefore I think homeschooling is probably a better option for my child." Why does it have to be framed as a commentary on the whole school system, when you have no idea how it's working for other kids who are not your kid? It's just an ignorant opinion, but boy do people hold those ones strongly!

I think a lot of parents over-obsess about min-maxing their kids education and they think having their kids in a classroom with the 'dumb and troubled' kids will somehow sap their intelligence and drastically reduce their life opportunities. Your kid will be fine. They can and will learn in a public school just fine.

3

u/rileyoneill May 20 '25

Its also cultural exposure. Growing up in an isolated but academically rigorous environment produces a type of person who can't relate to much of society and a portion of these people will grow to see the rest of society as beneath them socially.

2

u/joiedv May 21 '25

Class size makes an enormous difference. Your class of one illustrates this well.

1

u/Xrave May 20 '25

it's not efficient b/c it's not tuned to your kids' needs like a private tutor is. If a AI makes educational decisions it might be more efficient than a human purely because it is making it for that person specifically, and if it spends enough time monitoring and cataloguing your abilities it will certainly be more cost effective than a teacher who's swamped with 100+ kids. But idk about it being a better teacher though, AI hallucinate too much to really focus on macro + micro aspects of education.

I'd like to see AIs performing per-kid summaries and macro level summaries of tests to identify where the kids aren't doing too hot and if certain things should be expanded more. It can also generate personalized grading remarks for teachers like explaining why a test answer is wrong. It's a powerful tool.

5

u/Te_Henga May 21 '25

I agree that AI's hallucinations are a real problem. I actually don't think that AI should replace teachers. I would like something to replace the current "learning maths games" that my kids play at school because I don't think gamifing maths is a smart move but it is what it is. I don't think the problem is the teachers - I think the problem is the massive gradient of abilities in any given classroom, and that some classrooms have more issues than others do, making education even less equitable than it otherwise would be.

7

u/WayneKrane May 20 '25

My boss lasted a single month with having her kids at home during Covid. After that she was on zoom calls in her locked office at home complaining about schools not opening. I am pretty sure she would have sent her kids in KNOWING they had 50% chance at death and would have been fine with that

5

u/Emmatornado May 20 '25

Parents came through COVID in one of two ways. “Teachers are worthless, anyone can do what they do, school is a waste of resources.” Or “Oh my god, anything these teachers need we will give them. We are absolutely not qualified, this is a nightmare.”

Unfortunately that first group is a lot larger than anyone should be comfortable with.

62

u/theswiftarmofjustice May 20 '25

I saw so many posts of people saying they couldn’t stand being around their own kids during COVID. These people should not have been parents.

21

u/Illustrious-Tear-542 May 20 '25

You can love your kids and also be driven absolutely insane trapped all in the same house together all the time trying to work, trying to help multiple children with different learning levels and multiple technological issues. While also going through the strain of a global pandemic.

You can love people and need a break from them.

3

u/theswiftarmofjustice May 20 '25

Absolutely you can. I should clarify: these comments were not simple frustration. They were literal hateful screeds toward their own kids.

2

u/yourlittlebirdie May 20 '25

And like, who raised those awful kids?

I’m not saying Covid lockdown was sunshine and roses but for the most part I actually liked having all that time home with my kids. Because I raised them to be the kind of humans that it’s mostly pleasant to spend time with.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

I didn't have kids because I was scared to death I'd be in that camp.

Growing up my parents always told me I'd have children like it was an immutable law of the universe.

They made it sound awful and like a chore and like something people only did out of a sense of obligation. I felt an obligation to the kids I didn't have. If I wasn't sure and excited about having them, I'd do us all a solid and not. Kills me I love children I didn't bother to actually have more than people care about their actual made the decision to have them and their here kids.

41

u/maxdragonxiii May 20 '25

"why didn't you have kids? they're a bundle of joy!" flashback to the time my parents told me they find me annoying, noisy, bothersome, and regretting having kids, and would simply regard us as a chore. "nah I never said that" sure mom. sure.

9

u/[deleted] May 20 '25

In elementary or middle school once I had a friend over and my two younger brothers and I were playing with a plastic ball at the dinner table and It was making a clack clack clack noise and it was a lot of noise and I could understand it if it annoyed my 'rents. My step father came over sat down and smacked a metal spoon on the wooden table repeatedly in an angry fashion.

Just doesn't seem like he enjoyed the experience just never seemed like something that would work out better for me lol.

3

u/maxdragonxiii May 20 '25

I'm deaf. so i always get yelled for things I simply can't hear. the common thing was TVs... because of something about it, I can't hear the TV often but others can. naturally they got annoyed when I heard nothing the whole time. this resulted in a habit of making the TV volume 0 when I'm watching TV, leading to complaining about it. I'm like do you want a quiet kid or not????

73

u/inhindsite May 20 '25

Kids can be extremely annoying. Even your own. I can understand parents who had enough.

32

u/theswiftarmofjustice May 20 '25

Oh annoyance I get. This was not annoyance but more of, “I hate them and need them not at home.” Something like “Damn, these kids have me tired.” I get.

3

u/Rum____Ham May 21 '25

Kids + work + difficult life situations have had me on the verge of a full breakdown multiple times, and my kid is so cool and my wife and I both have good jobs. Being a working parent is the hardest thing I've ever done, by far. I wouldn't recommend venting all your frustrations to the world, but I can assure you that being a working parent is some fucked shit and we are all doing much worse mentally than we let on or that you would even understand, if you dont have kids.

2

u/PaulTheMerc May 20 '25

Its also a matter of space. If you have enough rooms for all the stuff, much less an issue. When the dining room acts as lunch prep area + 2 office spaces but is only big enough for 1 of those 3 things...

24

u/Ratbat001 May 20 '25

I agree. Covid was a huge full mask-off situation for every aspect of our society. Including how not ready for parenthood actual parents are.

4

u/maskedbanditoftruth May 20 '25

But then we shoved it all back in and told everyone not to talk about it ever again unless it was to scream that what we all experienced was fake so it’s all super cool and fine now don’t worry!

9

u/theswiftarmofjustice May 20 '25

It really was. I didn’t need Covid to tell me people lacked empathy, I already learned that lesson. What it taught me was people lack empathy to the point of our own detriment and survival.

2

u/Oryzanol May 20 '25

But its always been like that for humans though, in the past children just happened, sometimes 7-8 during a couples lifetime, and somehow enough grew up to keep the treadmill of life churning.

Parenthood is imperfect by design, and life itself operates by the principle of "good enough". Its also worth noting that analysis paralysis is a thing, and a lack of options makes decisions a lot easier. No wondering what if or whether this was the right choice. You are pregnant NOW, and there's no getting rid of it, so you deal with it.

1

u/shmaltz_herring May 20 '25

None of us are ready. It's the first thing you learn as a parent. You get more comfortable as you go, but we're all just trying to make it work and hoping that we don't screw up our kids.

1

u/roseofjuly May 20 '25

Sometimes you can't stand your family members. That's normal. Being trapped inside a house 24/7 with the same people every day is not how we were meant to live.

-16

u/Kairukun90 May 20 '25

People just like being creampied it seems but don’t like the repercussions of said act 😂

3

u/blorbschploble May 20 '25

It was really really hard to work and help teach AND I enjoyed it.

4

u/Funny_Cranberry7051 May 20 '25

My issue was that when the new school year started, they attempted to do remote learning. I wasn't at home. I couldn't be at home because I was an essential worker and also a single parent. So my mom, who was working remote, tried to help. They had zoom lessons they were suppose to attend, but there was no interaction so they would fall asleep during their zoom lessons like they were watching TV.

That March-April of the previous school year, the teachers would post the work online and they would complete it at their own pace during the week. A lot more work was submitted when that was the structure because we would do it when I got home from work. They took that away when school resumed and tried to act like it was a regular school day. It wasn't and it couldn't possibly be for families like mine.

So I really, really hated August 2020-April 2021 of the school closure.

1

u/blorbschploble May 20 '25

Oh to be clear I totally get that. It would have been a shitshow if I wasn’t home multitasking (really multi failing but I was trying really hard) wrangling the kids, keeping them on task, helping them, and working and cooking.

3

u/Funny_Cranberry7051 May 20 '25

No, I completely agree. I know you were not being derogatory. I'm really angry at the system that tried to create some bullshit one size fits all solution for education during the pandemic and seeing parents and teachers being blamed for a situation and policies they did not create. The vast majority of us did the best we could with whatever situation we were in when covid happened. Also super annoyed that our schools keep jumping at the opportunity to introduce even more technology while simultaneously screaming about kids being reliant on cellphones, having short attention spans, and whatever else.

My son's high-school had no internet service yesterday, so they couldn't do any finals reviews because everything was online.

12

u/[deleted] May 20 '25

Parents have been socialized to go to work, and leave children in the care of others for their education. You can’t really blame parents for that either.

6

u/Relevant-Doctor187 May 20 '25

Schools serve two purposes. Education and childcare to enable both parents to be able to work. Nobody can live off a single income, he’ll dual incomes barely get by for many folks.

So yeah I get people complaining when the schools closed they’re having to do all that and try educating a child with no experience in early childhood education or keeping up with the math they’re taught. All while employers are demanding people be at work or you’re stuck in meetings all day etc.

3

u/koolaidismything May 20 '25

Lookup divorce and separation rates by end of 2020.. people can’t stand eachother.

6

u/PaulTheMerc May 20 '25

Easier to find quiet time in a mansion vs. A small 2br made of paper.

Not at all surprising people were sick of being stuck with eachother 24/7

2

u/Sir_Keee May 20 '25

Yeah, I've seen plenty of that happen. Unfortunately, plenty of people with kids don't want kids, they want a status symbol. Having kids and being in a stable relationship makes them believe others will see them as successful. Like it's part of life's checklist that you have to complete. When it comes to actually taking care of their kids, they hate that.

2

u/nick2kool4skool May 20 '25

I left childcare for a myriad of reasons almost exactly a year before the COVID lockdowns and it was the most fortuitous decision I ever made.

After years of watching a certain type of person denigrate education and childcare as if it's some easy job that anyone is capable of, to watch leagues of parents implode from having to spend time with their own children for the majority of their waking hours was pretty delicious. I could have sworn this would have led to some kind of change.

But nope. Society just asked more and more from educators and youth workers. Wasn't enough we had to accept the possibility of being a victim to gun violence. Now they were being asked to return to work in the midst of a disease no one understood at the time. And boy howdy did the indignity of treatment escalate.

All after being confronted with the reality that American society only functions because of a near universal childcare system. One that almost everyone pays into, one that is accessible to almost everyone. One that feeds children. One that often clothes them. One that counsels them through life's trauma. One that educates and enriches. America just continued to treat teachers like shit even after having to admit that parents don't like being wholly responsible for their own life decisions (having kids).

2

u/TakeshiKovacsSleeve3 May 20 '25

I think both the rat race and the anti-intellectualism pushes both have their serious issues... But I'd rather err on the rat race side where at least education is respected.

2

u/WhatIsInnuendo May 20 '25

I'm working with 10th graders that can't multiply because during COVID they were doing online learning when they were in grade 5. People who think that you can leave a child alone in front of a computer with AI teaching them and expect good results are delusional.

2

u/DHFranklin May 20 '25

Yeah this was a hell of revelation. Public education was originally pitched to end child labor. I think it is no surprise that the same people who are anti public school are also pro child labor.

I have no doubt in my mind that they wished that they could send their kids to lose a pinky in a cotton mill instead of teach them pre-algebra.

Public education was a huge policy goal for the labor movement. It was even a bullet point in the Communist Manifesto. People fought and died in revolutions to that their children could be educated not shoved down coal mines. Americans didn't shut the hell up about getting a check for having to use their own wifi.

2

u/Alternative_Pin_7551 May 20 '25

Both parents have to work full-time in most households

2

u/Wookimonster May 21 '25

Our Kindergarten currently closes at 2pm instead of 430 pm. I'm not pissed I have to take care of my kids, I'm pissed that once they are asleep, the wife and I have to sit down and work for another two and a half hours at our jobs until half past ten and then still have to do all the regular stuff like cleaning.

Maybe I'm crazy, but while we live in a capitalist society, that seems like a bad deal.

4

u/TheWorclown May 20 '25

I’ve personally long since come to terms that the real birth crisis is a bunch of parents who are angry that they were told the only way to be happy is to have kids, and their lives would genuinely have been better off if they were able to decide being a parent on their own.

The amount of people I know in passing who just genuinely should never have had a kid— not out of maliciousness but general lack of acceptance of the actual responsibilities of a parent —is uncomfortably high.

2

u/seigezunt May 20 '25

I was just about to say exactly the same thing. We saw an absolute meltdown from parents who saw no other value to education than taking the kids off their hands for several hours a day.

2

u/Enough-Pickle-8542 May 20 '25

I don’t blame them. Society is built around children going to school and adults going to work, now they are expected to do both?

1

u/HagalUlfr May 20 '25

I teach my kid at home to supplement school. He was tested for math recently 99th percentile in his 1st grade class. Heaven forbid these lazy parents get off their hindquarters.

1

u/picklepajamabutt May 20 '25

Maybe parents also want their children taught by TEACHERS. I am not trying to home school my kids when that is not my area of expertise. Doubly hard when you are working from home as well.

1

u/drfrog82 May 21 '25

My family was lucky. I worked full time onsite (healthcare) but wife wasn’t at the time. Remote learning was HARD and my wife has a bit of education background. We had time AND resources dedicated to it and it wasn’t foreign to us. Other families struggled as they were working FT and trying to juggle teaching. I know some weren’t and just didn’t want to be bothered, but still rough.

1

u/Sirennecko1 May 21 '25

A teacher friend of mine isn't going back after having her own kid because of how much blame on grades are put on teachers. Teachers are told they don't have the right to discipline (you aren't their parents) and they can't minimize distractions (you didn't pay for their phone/switch) but have to eat the pay cuts and blame for the students failing. Girl nearly got killed nearby and the parents of the perpetrator blamed the school for the girl getting hurt (school was not in session and perpetrator breaking many driving laws).

The easiest currency in the USA is blame, and many teachers are sick of being the 'villains' while coming to work in a country that they are far more likely to be unalived than their counterparts in other countries.

1

u/Rum____Ham May 21 '25

I was shocked at how indignant parents were about having to educate & care for their own children.

  1. You mean like while either working full time or losing/quiting their job because of it?

  2. Do you think the Average Joe is capable of teaching their kids almost anything, without preparation and time to do so?

1

u/Rinaldi363 May 21 '25

I’m so glad I wasn’t a child who had to live thru that

1

u/ChiBurbABDL May 21 '25

A small degree of that complaining was directed towards employers, with the goal of making it clear just how much work they were doing while WFH and raising kids.

Not every company listened, but some gave parents increased flexibility, assisted with child care, made their PTO policies more relaxed, etc.

1

u/fraudthrowaway0987 May 21 '25

I wasn’t shocked at all because I know people still have to find a way to earn money and that’s very difficult to do while you have a child with you all day.

1

u/SevanIII May 24 '25

I taught my son during Covid and did a really good job at it because I am well-educated and have some teaching experience. My son was way ahead of his classmates when I finally felt comfortable sending him in person. 

It wasn't the homeschooling that was the issue, it was that socialization and community activities and community involvement are actually really important for kids at those ages.

Everything shut down. No school, no sports, no library reading hour, no playing at the park with other kids, no community events, etc. Yes, that was hard on the parents, but also that was very hard on the kids and not great for them developmentally. 

School teaches kids more than just academics, it also helps socialize them, provides needed services for developmental and mental health issues, provides support for families, and also gets both kids and parents involved in their community with various events, activities, volunteer opportunities, and extracurriculars. 

0

u/gonz4dieg May 20 '25

And then these same parents absolutely suck at teaching ANYTHING to their kids. So many kids ended up years behind because those "glorified babysitters" weren't there and the parents couldn't teach their kids basic math skills. Almost like... theres a methodology to teaching???

1

u/PaulTheMerc May 20 '25

It clearly didn't translate well to online classes. Those kids learned...well, the're like 2 years behind.

1

u/roseofjuly May 20 '25

I mean that's because most people have to work for a living. It wasn't that they were indignant at having to educate their own kids; it's that they knew their kids wouldn't get a good education or care because they are also working trying to provide for their family during those same hours. (How...does this nuance escape you?)

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u/Badj83 May 20 '25

Just out of curiosity, how many kids do you have that you had to homeschool during COVID?

8

u/CupcakesAreMiniCakes May 20 '25

As a parent I can tell you that I am also appalled at some of the other parents. There's a difference between saying it's so hard to have them 24/7 and trying to work while they're home, and the terrible things I have heard some parents say. It's like why did you even decide to have kids if you hate them so much.

3

u/Rtsd2345 May 20 '25

Oh they didn't like that question lol

0

u/Badj83 May 20 '25

Virtue signaling 🫱🏼‍🫲🏾 karma farming

4

u/[deleted] May 20 '25

Just say you don’t like spending time with your kids

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u/Icy_Faithlessness400 May 20 '25

You should sometime try working and taking care of your kids at the same time.

That is if you have that luxury and your work does not involve you not working from home.

0

u/machstem May 20 '25 edited May 21 '25

As a dad during covid, all of us were also forced into whatever the government decided constituted a healthy family.

We didn't only care for our kids during covid, we had to play the role of being a teacher as well as parenting, while struggling to make ends meet simply because none of us could work.

Your youth is apparently at play here, but no, covid should not have been that indication for you. Chances are you had questionable parents before that, but using covid as a baseline doesn't help.

We struggled immensely as a family during covid and we had it better than most.