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Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

nytimes.com

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Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#61

Post by iLoveOncall »

rps93 wrote: post #34
legitster wrote: post #26

Even if you're pro-AI, there's a reason calculators are banned from math classes until a certain point. It seems like a no-brainer to have people learn on hammers before moving them to nailguns. I can't help but think of this Chesterton Quote: "It is, on the contrary, a thing analogous to writing one's own love-letters or blowing one's own nose. These things we want a man to do for himself, even if he does them badly…

Im for this as I use AI in my current college classes to learn things quickly. Also, save money aka not have to buy/read the textbook. Using AI allows me to take and feed my notes to it and have it create multiple choice quizzes. Same for assignments where my teacher asks us to define terms. So far doing this I am able to retain things quickly and speak intelligently during the next class. So dont read the textbook,…

You're literally stealing from yourself by paying for tuition and not getting any benefit from it besides a piece of paper that won't hold to scrutiny once someone asks you to code something on an interview or in a company.

Intern quality at my FAANG has been dreadful for the past year, and new grads aren't much better. Most don't pass probation nowadays.

Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#62

Post by charcircuit »

anon7000 wrote: post #40
charcircuit wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like banning teachers or textbooks from school. LLMs are the single greatest learning technology ever created.

If kids use them for learning and not just cheating. You have to learn how to learn and how to think for yourself before you can do that

LLMs can teach you that too. You do not need to learn that first.

Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#63

Post by lazzlazzlazz »

GlacierFox wrote: post #10
rmason wrote: post #5

This makes about as much sense to me as banning all personal computers in the eighties from schools. You are putting these kids at a decided disadvantage.

[flagged]

There's nearly zero AI zealotry on here. As of the time of my posting, almost every comment here on Hacker News is both supportive of the measure and largely against AI. This is now a neo-Luddite messaging board.

Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#65

Post by charcircuit »

Zetaphor wrote: post #54
charcircuit wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like banning teachers or textbooks from school. LLMs are the single greatest learning technology ever created.

Saying that a human teacher is equivalent to an LLM is derogatory to the teachers and exaggerating the capabilities of the LLM. I say this as someone who uses these things daily in my work and personal life. Let's not murky the waters with complete falsehoods

LLMs have been better than many teachers I've had in my life. To no fault of the teachers, it's hard to compete with something that has understanding of every subject, is hooked up to the internet, and is given 1:1 time with the person learning at any time of the day, answering promptly.

Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#66

Post by adolfojp »

iLoveOncall wrote: post #61
rps93 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Im for this as I use AI in my current college classes to learn things quickly. Also, save money aka not have to buy/read the textbook. Using AI allows me to take and feed my notes to it and have it create multiple choice quizzes. Same for assignments where my teacher asks us to define terms. So far doing this I am able to retain things quickly and speak intelligently during the next class. So dont read the textbook,…

You're literally stealing from yourself by paying for tuition and not getting any benefit from it besides a piece of paper that won't hold to scrutiny once someone asks you to code something on an interview or in a company. Intern quality at my FAANG has been dreadful for the past year, and new grads aren't much better. Most don't pass probation nowadays.

I figure this is quickly becoming an either use steroids for bodybuilding competitions even if you're against them or opt out of competing kind of situation.

Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#67

Post by wyre »

charcircuit wrote: post #62
anon7000 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If kids use them for learning and not just cheating. You have to learn how to learn and how to think for yourself before you can do that

LLMs can teach you that too. You do not need to learn that first.

They can, but I don't think we are there yet. No need to sending taxpayer dollars to silicon valley on educating the next generation using a new technology that hasn't proven itself in education yet.

Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#68

Post by charcircuit »

jansport123 wrote: post #42
charcircuit wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like banning teachers or textbooks from school. LLMs are the single greatest learning technology ever created.

technology seems to bifurcate outcomes - the top students seem to get much better than previous cohorts but the rest of them seem to get a lot worse.

I don't want the government to be forcing people into the worse outcome just to make outcomes more equal.

Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#69

Post by donatj »

bugbull wrote: post #47
hombre_fatal wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t imagine how many shortcuts I would have taken as a kid/teen or stressed uni student if AI were an option. I can see even a well-meaning student stuck in this aspirational cycle of “I’ll do it myself next time, but right now I just want to catch up.”

There were certainly integral solving validators online when I took calculus in high school. At some point I gave up and just used that, because “the money is in web application development, I don’t need that calculus stuff”. Big regret. Edit: For reference, the regret came when I tried to do some RF related projects on the side. Those projects would likely have gone somewhere if I put some effort into even the basic…

In 2004 I had a program on my TI-89 "Calculus Made Easy". It would do basically everything AND show your work.

Someone gave it to me about 2/3's of the way through Calc 1. I truly regret having become dependent on it. I studied enough to know roughly what I was doing but not enough to not be dependent.

I suspect learning with AI is the same sort of thing. You're learning, but you're not deep learning .

Re: Mamdani bans AI in NYC schools

#70

Post by pj_mukh »

jansport123 wrote: post #46
pj_mukh wrote: post #37

The dirty secret on NYC schools is that the upper-middle class tends to send their kids to private schools unless they can get their kids into some gifted/talented public schools. The real experimentation on what tools will and will not work is happening there under the watchful eye of wealthy hyper-involved (see: comfy jobs w/ adequate spare time) parents. I don't know what level of digital tools is best for which t…

bigger reason to ban AI in public schools then. AI + neglectful parents is a disaster in the making.

Yes that would work out well if by this ban we could also properly fund schools to create enough teaching staff. But you and I both know that's not happening.

So on the off-chance one of these tools (that even used AI in the background) could create a tool that actually worked well for, say, gifted public schools kids that don't need as much one-on-one attention, they could free up limited human teacher hours to give weaker kids more attention, that is no longer a possibility.

That possibility, only remains for private school kids, who don't even need it in the first place.

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