The hottest Ed-tech Substack posts right now

Public schools have moved to a lowest-common-denominator model that removed gifted programs and ability-based pacing, which warehouses students and crushes the curiosity of high-achievers.
Structural choices—de-leveling, social promotion, centralized funding, rising behavior issues, weaker teacher pipelines, and shifting student demographics—create incentives that block real, high-quality instruction.
The remedy is to restore ability tracking, discipline, ESL support, and true gifted options or adopt market solutions like vouchers, and fast-growing AI-based individualized learning will make alternatives irresistible if schools don’t adapt.

The Alpha School reports unusually high student growth that suggests its practices might actually accelerate learning, but a randomized lottery study would be needed to be sure.
Many miracle-school results can come from selection, unique funding, or unsustainable practices, so impressive outcomes aren’t automatically easy to replicate.
Ed tech can harm motivation when it feels like wasted or punitive effort, but better tools or reward structures might help—and the overall causal link between digital adoption and falling scores is still uncertain.

A free, research-informed toolkit gives schools ready-made surveys and measures to track how phone policies affect students, teachers, administrators, and parents.
It works for both single-school evaluations and large, rigorous studies—Qualtrics formats and optional collaboration with the Stanford Social Media Lab support longitudinal tracking and advanced analysis.
The toolkit adds practical analysis help (a manual scoring guide, a customizable survey builder, and a coming Data Dashboard), but it doesn’t by itself establish definitive causality without stronger study designs.

Students are earnest, hardworking, and take initiative. Many land internships as freshmen, so the school suits motivated, practical learners.
The school still struggles with poor coordination and frequent changes of plan that create avoidable snafus. It needs better formal communication and modest structure without turning into rigid bureaucracy.
Teachers should give clearer road maps but are experimenting with AI tools like “vibe-coding,” “vibe-reading,” and “vibe-tutoring” to improve learning and writing. The plan is to have AI show suggested edits while leaving rewrites to the students so they learn.

People are increasingly using AI as a shortcut to avoid hard mental work, and that trend risks weakening our capacity to reason and think deeply.
AI can be a useful tool for tasks like searching or coding, but it shouldn’t replace developing real thinking skills or the unique value of human, artisanal creativity.
Education’s main purpose is to build the mental muscles needed for professional and civic life, so relying on AI instead of practicing reasoning will leave people ill-prepared for complex roles.

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An exclusive webinar with Nir Eyal was fully booked, but the conversation will be released on a podcast.
Blume Ventures raised $102 million for their early-stage fund, showing success in the startup world.
Unacademy, an ed-tech company, secured $110 million for growth, starting as a Youtube channel.