Dan Hart and Michelle Michael: Bringing AI to Students in New South Wales

Dan Hart and Michelle Michael: Bringing AI to Students in New South Wales

Author: Daniel Bashir July 4, 2024 Duration: 1:13:54
The Gradient: Perspectives on AI
TechnologyScience

Episode 129

I spoke with Dan Hart and Michelle Michael about:

* Developing NSWEduChat, an AI-powered chatbot designed and delivered by the NSW Department of Education for students and teachers.

* The challenges in effectively teaching students as technology develops

* Understanding and defining the importance of the classroom

Enjoy—and let me know what you think!

Dan Hart is Head of AI, and Michelle Michael is Director of Educational Support and Rural Initiatives at the New South Wales (NSW) Department of Education.

Find me on Twitter for updates on new episodes, and reach me at editor@thegradient.pub for feedback, ideas, guest suggestions.

I spend a lot of time on this podcast—if you like my work, you can support me on Patreon :) You can also support upkeep for the full Gradient team/project through a paid subscription on Substack!

Subscribe to The Gradient Podcast:  Apple Podcasts  | Spotify | Pocket Casts | RSSFollow The Gradient on Twitter

Outline:

* (00:00) Intro

* (00:48) How NSWEduChat came to be, educational principles for AI use

* (02:37) Educational environment in New South Wales

* (04:41) How educators have adapted to new challenges for teaching and assessment

* (07:47) Considering technology advancement while teaching and assessing students

* (12:14) Educating teachers and students about how to use AI tools

* (15:03) AI in the classroom and enabling teachers

* (19:44) Product-first thinking for educational AI

* (22:15) Red teaming and testing

* (24:02) Benchmarking, chatbots as an assistant

* (26:35) The importance of the classroom

* (28:10) Media coverage and hype

* (30:35) Measurement and the benchmarking process/methodology

* (34:50) Principles for how chatbots should interact with students

* (44:29) Producing good educational outcomes at scale

* (46:41) Operating with speed and effectiveness while implementing governance

* (49:03) How the experience of building technologies evolves

* (51:45) Identifying good technologists and educators for development and use

* (55:07) Teaching standards and how AI impacts teachers

* (57:01) How technologists incorporate teaching standards and expertise in their work

* (1:00:03) NSWEduChat model details

* (1:02:55) Value alignment for NSWEduChat

* (1:05:40) Practicing caution in filtering chatbot responses

* (1:07:35) Equity and personalized instruction — how NSWEduChat can help

* (1:10:19) Helping students become “the students they could be”

* (1:13:39) Outro

Links:

* NSWEduChat

* Guardian article on NSWEduChat



Get full access to The Gradient at thegradientpub.substack.com/subscribe

Hosted by Daniel Bashir, The Gradient: Perspectives on AI moves beyond surface-level headlines to explore the intricate machinery and human ideas shaping artificial intelligence. Each episode is built on a foundation of deep research, leading to conversations that are both technically substantive and broadly accessible. You'll hear from researchers, engineers, and philosophers who are actively building and critiquing our technological future, discussing not just how AI systems work, but the larger implications of their integration into society. This isn't about speculative hype; it's a grounded examination of real progress, persistent challenges, and ethical considerations from those on the front lines. The discussions peel back layers on topics like model architecture, policy, and the fundamental science behind the algorithms becoming part of our daily lives. For anyone curious about the substance behind the buzz-whether you have a technical background or are simply keen to understand a defining technology of our age-this podcast offers a crucial and thoughtful resource. Tune in for a consistently detailed and nuanced take that treats artificial intelligence with the complexity it deserves.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Official website RSS
spotify
The Gradient: Perspectives on AI
Podcast Episodes
Joss Fong: Videomaking, AI, and Science Communication [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:23:59
Episode 117“You get more of what you engage with. Everyone who complains about coverage should understand that every click, every quote tweet, every argument is registered by these publications as engagement. If what you…
Kate Park: Data Engines for Vision and Language [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 41:34
In episode 116 of The Gradient Podcast, Daniel Bashir speaks to Kate Park. Kate is the Director of Product at Scale AI. Prior to joining Scale, Kate worked on Tesla Autopilot as the AI team’s first and lead product manag…
Ben Wellington: ML for Finance and Storytelling through Data [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:07:40
In episode 115 of The Gradient Podcast, Daniel Bashir speaks to Ben Wellington.Ben is the Deputy Head of Feature Forecasting at Two Sigma, a financial sciences company. Ben has been at Two Sigma for more than 15 years, a…
Venkatesh Rao: Protocols, Intelligence, and Scaling [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:18:35
“There is this move from generality in a relative sense of ‘we are not as specialized as insects’ to generality in the sense of omnipotent, omniscient, godlike capabilities. And I think there's something very dangerous t…
Sasha Rush: Building Better NLP Systems [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 54:03
In episode 113 of The Gradient Podcast, Daniel Bashir speaks to Professor Sasha Rush.Professor Rush is an Associate Professor at Cornell University and a Researcher at HuggingFace. His research aims to develop natural la…
Nicholas Thompson: AI and Journalism [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 59:43
In episode 111 of The Gradient Podcast, Daniel Bashir speaks to Nicholas Thompson.Nicholas is the CEO of The Atlantic. Previously, he served as editor-in-chief of Wired and editor of Newyorker.com. Nick also cofounded At…
Russ Maschmeyer: Spatial Commerce and AI in Retail [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 55:41
In episode 109 of The Gradient Podcast, Daniel Bashir speaks to Russ Maschmeyer.Russ is the Product Lead for AI and Spatial Commerce at Shopify. At Shopify, he leads a team that looks at how AI can better empower entrepr…

«12345678...10»