Artificial Intelligence is changing the way we work much faster than schools are changing the way we learn. And this may be one of the biggest problems with education today. For decades, the formula seemed relatively simple. Go to school, learn, get good grades, pass exams, get a degree, and get a good job.
Millions of parents have raised their children with this idea. And for much of the 20th century, it worked. But something extraordinary is happening today: the world we are preparing our children for is changing faster than the system that is supposed to prepare them for it. And at the center of this change is Artificial Intelligence.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE? THE SCHOOL WAS BUILT FOR ANOTHER WORLD
The traditional education model still relies heavily on a linear logic: acquire knowledge, reproduce it in an exam, earn a qualification and use it to enter the job market. The problem is that the job market is no longer changing in a linear way. AI is entering programming, marketing, finance, design, medicine, media, law, scientific research and almost every profession that relies on information.
Tasks that only a few years ago required hours of human labor can now be completed in minutes. This does not necessarily mean that “AI will take all our jobs.” This is an overly simplistic formulation. But what happens when a person who knows how to use Artificial Intelligence competes with a person who does not know how to use it? That is where the real problem begins.
CHILDREN ARE USING IT. BUT WHO IS TEACHING THEM HOW TO USE IT?
And here a paradox appears. Children and teenagers are most likely to encounter Artificial Intelligence outside of school. They can use it to search for information, to write, to create images, to program or simply to experiment. Meanwhile, adults are increasingly using it in the workplace and business. So we have a technology that is entering real life from both sides.
But in the middle stands school. And the debate in many cases continues to be: Should AI be allowed or banned? On the other hand, a technology that will be part of a generation’s professional life cannot be treated only as a new way to copy homework.
USING CHATGPT DOESN’T MEAN YOU KNOW HOW TO USE IT
This is perhaps the part that risks being misunderstood the most. Asking a chatbot a question and copying the answer is not a skill. On the contrary, using AI well requires precisely the skills that schools need to develop the most: knowing how to formulate the right question; distinguishing a correct answer from a convincing but wrong one; checking sources; comparing information; thinking critically; understanding the limitations of technology; and above all, knowing what problem you are trying to solve. In this sense, AI does not diminish the importance of education. It can even make it more important. But only if what we mean by “education” changes.
FROM “REMEMBER THE ANSWER” TO “KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH THE ANSWER”
For a long time, much of the value of school came from the transfer of information. The teacher had the information. The book had the information. The student had to learn it. Today, a child with a phone in their hand can access, in seconds, more information than they could absorb in a lifetime.
And with AI, it doesn’t just take information. It can ask for explanations, summaries, simulations, ideas, codes, analyses and alternatives. So the advantage of the future won’t be simply: “I know more”. It will be: “I know how to think, judge, create and solve problems using what I have available”. This is a much bigger difference than it seems.
WHAT IF EXAMS NO LONGER MEASURED WHAT MATTERS MOST?
If AI can write an acceptable essay, solve an exercise, summarize a book, or generate code, then the education system faces an uncomfortable question: What should we value in the student? Just the final product? Or the thought process that produced it?
Perhaps the school of the future will need to value more the ability to argue, to verify, to collaborate, to build something, to solve a real problem, and to defend an idea. Because in a world where machines can produce answers, the human ability to ask the right question becomes much more valuable.
HE SHOULD NOT REPLACE THE TEACHER
There is also the opposite danger: getting so excited about technology that we think it can replace school. It can’t. A child doesn’t just need information. They need people to challenge them, motivate them, correct them, and help them develop character, curiosity, discipline, and relationships with others. AI can be an incredibly powerful tool. But precisely because it is so powerful, children need even more teachers to teach them how to use it without handing over their thinking process to technology.
THE QUESTION WE SHOULD ASK THE SCHOOL
“What should an 18-year-old in 2035 know to be able to live and work in the world that is being created today?” is the question we all need to ask ourselves today. Because the children who enter school today will enter a job market that we do not yet fully understand.
Many of the tools they will use have not yet been created. Some of the professions they will practice may not exist today. And many of the skills that are considered an advantage today may be simply the minimum necessary tomorrow. Therefore, the challenge is not to teach children to compete against Artificial Intelligence. The challenge is much more interesting: to teach them to do what technology cannot do for them, to think, to judge, to choose, to create and to take responsibility.