AI Won’t Fix American Education

Every generation seems to find a new approach to fix American education. Today, it's artificial intelligence.Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, investor Marc Andreessen, and a growing number of policymakers argue that generative AI will democratize education by giving every student a personalized tutor, writing coach, research assistant, and study partner available around the clock. If every child has access to individualized instruction, they suggest, longstanding achievement gaps will begin to narrow.It's an appealing vision. It is also a familiar one.As a historian of education and former public school teacher, I have spent more than 35 years watching education reforms arrive with extraordinary fanfare and confidence. Each was promised to transform opportunities for disadvantaged students. Each produced some genuine benefits. Yet none fundamentally changed the inequalities that shape educational achievement in the U.S.That is because Americans have long asked schools to solve problems that originate far beyond the classroom.The belief itself is almost as old as public education. In 1848, Horace Mann, the first secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education, called schools "the grea...