ABOUT THIS EPISODE
In this episode of **Futuristic**, Cameron is joined by his old friend **Nick Johnstone**, Principal of Toowoomba Anglican School, to explore how **AI is reshaping the future of education**. They dive into the role of schools in a world where every student might have access to unlimited knowledge in their pocket, how teachers’ responsibilities may shift toward mentorship and motivation, and whether schools are even necessary when AI tutors can personalize learning better than any human. The conversation ranges from the challenges of managing devices in classrooms, to what employment might look like in a post-AI economy, to whether robots might one day replace teachers. Along the way, they touch on the social role of schools, legislative drag, the fate of universities, and even sneak in a nostalgic chat about Alice Cooper.
Cameron: [00:00:00] welcome back to the Futuristic, uh, I’m doing this today. My name is Cameron Reilly. For new people doing this without my usual partner in crime, Steve Sammartino, because he’s off doing a keynote somewhere, said he couldn’t make it as is his usual want. But, uh, I’m being joined instead today by an even older friend of mine than Steve.
I’ve known Steve 20 years. Nick and I go back 30. Five years, probably.
How old are we? 55, 83. Nick Johnstone, principal of Toowoomba Anglican School. Uh, recently crowned, uh, the principal of Toowoomba Anglican School. Previously principal of other schools, but yeah, Nick and I go back to grade eight. In Bundaberg and, uh, I, I, I invited [00:01:00] Nick to come on.
I sent him an article I wrote recently on some of my thoughts and prognostications about the future of schooling and education in a world of ai. And Nick gave me some great feedback and I said, come on and let’s chat about it. One of the things, welcome Nick, by the way, welcome to the show. As people can tell, I took all of Nick’s hair over the years and, um.
Nick Johnstone: at some, at some point we had equal hair, but that didn’t last for very long.
Cameron: No, it didn’t last very long as I recall. Um, one of the things, I’m gonna blow some smoke up, um, your backside for a bit. One of the things I’ve always liked about Nick is, uh, you know, Nick and I, uh, you know, science tech guys always have been, and Alice Cooper, uh, science Tech, Alice Cooper. The Beastie Boys, you know, um, bit of Van Halen.
Uh, Nick and I used to, I remember, uh, when David Lee Roth came out with, uh, Yankee Rose, you and I dancing at the school, [00:02:00] discos along to that, trying out testing out our high kicks. How’s your high kick going these days? It’s good. You’re staying limber.
Nick Johnstone: in the Hemi.
Cameron: Good. Yeah. Yeah. Um, no, in all seriousness, Nick, um. In terms of a, a principle I know is very pro technology and it’s, you know, I know you work in sort of the, the, the private school religious sector yet have remained pro tech on the front foot, very, um, on the very aggressive in terms of figuring out how to integrate.
New technologies. So it makes you the perfect person to come on and talk about this. Um, before I hit you with a barrage of questions though, Nick, um, why don’t we start by, I’ll ask you to give the audience your. Current application of [00:03:00] technologies in your schools? Like what, what are you doing today? We can talk about the future in a minute, but let’s talk about how you approach technology in your school today.
What, what your attitudes are.
Nick Johnstone: sure. Um, I guess that, um, I, I, I’ll take a slice
maybe the last five years. ’cause I think probably going back further than that doesn’t have, um. translatable ability into the future. But in the, in the last five years, um, I see the opportunities of technology in education being transformative, I’ll use that term.
I know it’s a fairly large in the context of to today’s society, but, so in my immediate last school, Bishop Drew College, where I was, uh, head there for, uh, almost seven and a half years. Uh, our aim was to go from a relatively traditional. of education. So we didn’t have a learning management system in the school. Um, we had, um, [00:04:00] a relatively recent, uh, laptop program, but we wanted to create more than that. We wanted to create opportunities for kids to work in the online environment, um, but also in the asynchronous environment as well as the synchronous environment. we set up, um, uh. A system where the kids basically could have access to the class content.
There was tutorials built into those, uh, processes as well. Uh, that was the first part of it. The second part of it was we wanted to amplify that. we actually established an online school, uh, that’s called Horizons, uh, and in the first instance it was set up so that it could create greater flexibility for students within our current. structures. So for example, instead of running a class before school hours or after school hours, we would give greater flexibility in the line structure of a school. So basically a student could have a spare, [00:05:00] but in that spare they would do another online subject that was run by our school. Um, with the plan of testing that through a, you know, um, better testing, lots of feedback from students and staff and parents to then, uh. Expand that model to externals. Uh, so that’s the process that’s occurring at the moment in that school. Um, I’ve changed schools in the last 15 weeks and I’m at Toowoomba Anglican School. Uh, and this school is at the start of, um, a similar journey in the fact that, um. They need a, uh, uh, a transformative learning management system that allows the students to have better access both, um, in class environments, but also giving them the flexibility of the day that they currently don’t have. I mean, we have a lot of partners, you know, um, external consultants and teachers coming in. The kids go out to TAFE and a variety of other programs for certificate. Pathways. We have relationships with the universities and those sort sorts of things as well, but we didn’t have a lot of those online [00:06:00] opportunities. Um, so that’s sort of the, the journey we’re on at, at in this school. But
Cameron: And you’re a K to, you’re a K to 12,
Nick Johnstone: yeah, we’ve got three year olds to 18 year olds. of
Cameron: right?
Nick Johnstone: at have had early years through to year 12. So, um,
in fact my entire career has been. in K 12 environments.
Cameron: Right. And, and your attitude towards, uh, devices and the internet in your schools, how, how do you approach that? Usually, I.
Nick Johnstone: Yeah, it’s, it’s been an interesting one ’cause there’s been that sort of, uh, push back and forth on that. Um, I, I would say I, I’m pro devices. But I’m probably not pro phones in the adolescent context in school. I, I haven’t always been that way. Cam, I’ve gotta say, in fact, I remember speaking at a senior year’s, conference at University Queensland for probably [00:07:00] 13 or 14 years ago when mobile phones were first sort of a thing, is being able to use the, um, the inner science context, you know, all, all of our phones, you know.
Have accelerometers and et cetera in them. And how can we use that to, not just, um, the communication style of education, but also, you know, can we use it in physics? Can we use it in biology? Can we use it in other, in other contexts of, uh, of, of maths and science in particular. Um, and, but I’ve, I’ve stood back from that now because of the distraction factor of a lot of mobile phones in class. I’m not one. That, you know, does the whole, um, uh, put ’em in a pouch, put ’em in a locker, never be seen again. Scenario, uh, we live in, um, modern world. But, um, the flip side of that is it’s all about teaching kids the responsibilities of having a computer in their pocket. Um,
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: And, and that when we all live in this [00:08:00] world, we can’t pretend that it’s not, it’s not reality. But I also subscribe to a fair bit of what a, what Jonathan Holt talks about in his work about just making sure the kids are appropriately ready for technology. Um, and there’s, I’m gonna say security and oversight without much restriction. I know, and that’s a spectrum there. I know. But,
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: that’s pretty much how I’ve, how I feel now and. I haven’t felt Al always felt that way.
Cameron: I can imagine it’s really difficult as it’s difficult being a parent. You know, your kids are older than Fox. You know, you, I’ve got adult kids. You’ve got adult kids. Fox is 11, so he’s in that. Phase where he’s always on a device and you know, it’s difficult being a parent, a ProTech parent.
Like, I want you to have devices, I want you to have technology.
But at the same time, I know that it’s an absolute, you know, massive landmine and distraction and comes with a whole bunch of problems. [00:09:00] And then you’ve got a thousand kids to have to worry about how you manage that. So I imagine it’s a, an order of magnitude more difficult.
Nick Johnstone: perspective. Um, I didn’t. Jump into the mobile phones for my children until they were 15. and that was
Cameron: Yeah. Right.
Nick Johnstone: a decision that we made as parents, rightly or wrongly. That was just a decision that we made in the context of our family at that time. Having said that, both of my sons used technology exclusively in their careers.
You know, my youngest is a recording artist based in London. and, and my, my oldest works in, uh, rock and roll media and, and works in Brisbane. Um, and they need devices on them all the time. So,
Cameron: Yeah. Yeah.
Nick Johnstone: it’s the world we live in. Not every career is that, but I mean, know a lot of them are,
Cameron: And of course you and I grew up in an era where, um, we had a computer [00:10:00] room at high school where we went and did computers and we weren’t allowed to have calculators because our teachers would always tell us, when you grow up, you’re not gonna have a calculator with you at all times. I go, no, I’ve got an ai.
Uh, you know, you are right, I guess. But it was, you know, we’ve, we’ve sort of come through those generations of technology and, and seen how it’s impacted what the attitudes were towards keeping technology outta kids’ hands when we were in high school right through to today, where the technology is obviously so integrated into our daily lives.
So the, the, the question that I was posing in my article. That I want to really drill down with you on is what the role of schooling K through 12 and then of course tertiary may look like in a few years if we proceed with the assumption. Rightly or wrongly, because there a lot of things could, uh, go awry with this.
But working on the [00:11:00] assumption that the tech industry, the Silicon Valley, uh, consensus as Eric Schmidt, uh, calls it, is that within a few years we are all going to have some, I won’t use the term super intelligent, but
Nick Johnstone: Hmm.
Cameron: intelligent device. Uh, our phones, our laptops, our glasses. Our watches, whatever other wearable devices they come up with, will have access to an intelligence that is probably as knowledgeable on every topic as the best humans in that field are.
So the best. Possible teacher on every possible topic. It also understands every individual in a way that. No other human can understand that individual because it’s reading [00:12:00] your emails, it’s, it’s reading your text messages, it’s listening to your in-person conversations with people. It knows what your.
Uh, neuro divergencies are your, which learning modalities you prefer. It’s infinitely patient. It can present a humanistic human-like avatar. It can talk to you in a human voice and have you talk to it. It can. Basically come in and teach, you know, Fox has been using it to help him learn decimals. He’s sort of grade five through to, you know, talking to you about, you know, PhD level chemistry or biology or physics or whatever.
Um, I, I’m wondering how you see this playing out, what the role of schools might be. Let’s just say, I think it’s gonna happen a lot faster than this, but say five years from now, let’s say 20 20, 20 30. [00:13:00] 2030. These devices are in everyone’s pocket. They’re, they’re, let’s say that the access to this is essentially free ’cause it’s given away with the phone and the laptop, like Siri is, it’s part of the operating system.
What do schools look like in 2030? Nick?
Nick Johnstone: Uh, I go back a step there. Cam, there’s two parts to it. There’s what is the role of education? Because not the same as the role of schools,
Cameron: Still. Yep.
Nick Johnstone: so AI in the context of the role of education. I totally agree with everything you said with regard to, the inputs into that. Um, certainly around, um. Having a tutor that is purpose made for your needs to be able to help you build your knowledge base, understanding it, and take you, and take you from that, um, [00:14:00] the, the basic knowledge through the, you know, the, the theory of gradual release of, uh, of responsibility.
So you’re building content, knowledge, skills over time. Uh, got no doubt that in the next five years, that will change hugely from being, um, I’m gonna say bitsy in the, in the area of education to being fully immersive. That will change.
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: Um, and I don’t know. fast that will change, of course. But like most things in, in technology, it’s, it’s almost exponential growth. Um, and that’s the reality going back from, you know, um, you know, microchip invention to, to the current day we are now, it, it’s been rapid growth beyond what we could have imagined as kids Looking at Star Wars and Star Trek, um, all those years ago. It’s, it’s, it’s. Far exceeded. [00:15:00] Well, it’s probably in line with some of wacky concepts of really. But, um, so that’s the role of education. I think it’ll be really, really important in that. But the role of schools, I think is actually slightly different to that. Um, it’ll, it’ll absorb all of those things of the role of education, but it will also include, A, a humanistic con, um, component. So I think we’ll always need adults in education in schools.
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: teachers.
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: Um, and I think that will change, hope no union people are listening to this, but I think it will change. Um, you know, um, the, the, the, the responsible adult in the room, I’ll call ’em the teacher for the sake of this. They’ll,
turn into more of a, instead of the, you know, [00:16:00] the, the keeper of the font of knowledge and the. And the holy grail of what’s right and wrong, wrong, that they’ll turn into more of the, you know, the motivator, the facilitator, those kind of roles. But we are dealing with miners here.
Those that are under, particularly those that are under the age of 16. they have, um. Requirements for supervision and care. Uh, so in the schooling, in the schooling context, that’s really vital. You know, we, we need to make sure that we are meeting our safe, child standards, processes, um, and all those sort of things as well.
So, carer, motivat. that’s our role in schools on top of all of that role of education with AI into school context. So that will mean there’ll be changes in class size, class structures, class times, day lengths, you know, um, [00:17:00] there’s a lot of schools experimenting with the, with the shorter day at the moment to still meet their curriculum requirements. Um, there’ll be a shakeup backwards from schools and society back into, policy. well. So at the moment in, in certain policy documents, particularly in the senior schools, there’s a certain number of hours you are required to teach. Now if teaching fundamentally changes, are those hours of duty to teach valid anymore, um, does it become more of an outcomes based scenario?
So you do a pretest and if you pass the pretest, there’s no point teaching you that. So there’s no point spending 55
in a semester to teach you the biology if you’re already. I’ve 80% the biology test, um, you’d move on to the next one. So that age definition for classes, classes maybe will be multi-age.
Because of that, uh, it’ll, it’ll fundamentally change the structure of schools. No doubt. Um, [00:18:00] I guess, outside of that, are also opportunities for kids, not just to learn the, the curriculum work, but ob obviously to learn how to interact with other kids of their age, other kids, you know, younger and older, them, how to interact with adults. KI kids, as, as you well know, they behave differently for their parents. As they do for others, they often
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: at school than they’re at home. home is where they get
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: down and, you know, act
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: But, and that’s good.
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: the experience of being a child. So I, I think there’s a, that’s a big question how it will change.
I, I think it’ll change in every way a school structure.
Cameron: So there’s a, there’s a lot to unpack there. I mean, talking about the need for adult supervision. My, my natural reaction to that is until we have robots. Um, that, uh, again, if [00:19:00] you, if you believe the people that are building the robot humanoid robot industries, Steve Santino normally hosts the show with me, just bought his first humanoid robot, cost him $16,000.
I don’t think he gets it until December, but it’s, it’s been pre-ordered. Um. You know, the, the forecast from the, the robotics industry, Elon Musk and, and people like him, is that by the end of this decade, humanoid robots will cost about the same as a budget car.
So 10 to 20 grand. Um, they’ll be running the latest advanced AI platform, whatever it is, five years from now.
So I know Jensen Huang, the CEO of Nvidia is talking about giving their, their AI platform away for free with their robots because, um, or their chips that are in the robots ’cause they wanna ship chips. So you, if you [00:20:00] buy a robot with an Nvidia chip, you get the AI for free, you know. I know Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI has said he’s envisioning a day when they give you a robot for free with your AI subscription.
So he flips it on the head, but it’s like getting a mobile phone for free if you sign up for a Telstra plan for 24 months, right? You get the hardware for free,
Nick Johnstone: you
Cameron: essentially.
Nick Johnstone: a basic, um, screen and you and your streaming services are a subscription service for your, for your media currently. And, um, and then you’ve got, you know, other boxes that sit on top of that, that manipulate the data to, to give you the algorithm you want or you think you.
Cameron: Yeah.
Nick Johnstone: I, I, yeah, I think so. That’s probably, um, a likely outcome. Robotics, uh, I, I will say that any sort of scientific change, um, and I’m gonna say western world here, um, it has legislative drag. Um, and [00:21:00] in, in Australian society, I mean, a, a, as you know, my, my love during my early university years, it was genetics. I literally
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: degree and could not get a job in Australia because of the legislative drag. most of the
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: in the laboratory had been passed through special provisions. ’cause we’re a tertiary institution that we could do them, but we couldn’t actually go to the workplace and do them. Um, and. It’s no different with, with technology. And I think ai, um, I mean, at the moment they’ve obviously got frameworks. I read them from cover to cover. Um, they’re so open-ended and so nondescript, you can pretty much do what you like at the moment. but at some
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: change will come. And I, I do think even though robots will eventually be involved in, you know, everything from, from, from babysitting to obviously the driving, which is already occurring now, um. And [00:22:00] all of that sort of, uh, componentry, there’ll be legislative catch up that’s required and, and that’ll, that’ll cause certain restrictions in certain countries. Uh,
Cameron: I think that legislative drag will be compressed by AI as well, though.
Nick Johnstone: maybe,
Cameron: You say to the ai, write the, write the, write the policy for us,
Nick Johnstone: yeah. Yeah. But,
Cameron: and it does, you know.
Nick Johnstone: to be voted on by humans with constituents.
Cameron: Yes, yes. And then there’s a question of, you know, um, how that is impacted by AI as well. But, okay. So le leaving aside the robots thing though, because, uh, you know, there’s a lot of unknowns there. Although, you know, with, um, I, I’m not sure how much you know about this, but, um, there was a. A kindergarten near us where one of the teachers turned out to be the worst pedophile in Australian history.
Um, he’s been in jail for the last year or two. He was one of, he was Fox’s teacher, [00:23:00] Fox was his student at that very, um, uh, uh, highly admired
Nick Johnstone: Yeah.
Cameron: but. It all came out with the rise of those sorts of things. You know, I can see parents going, do we wanna entrust our children to humans or do we wanna entrust them to robots, which is safer.
Uh, there will be an argument that, uh, maybe robots will be safer. But leaving that aside, let’s just talk about the social stuff. So you, you acknowledge that the role of teachers is probably gonna change when the AI is the teacher. Or a better teacher than most teachers could possibly be for all of those other reasons, not that they don’t want to be, but because it just understands that kid far better than any human can, particularly if they’ve got 30 kids in a class.
The, the social aspect of it is interesting too because, well, for one, I, I wonder, do parents need to send their kids to school if
kids are getting taught by the ai? [00:24:00] Um, I mean, I like Fox going to school. Fox likes going to school, but it costs money. He goes to a small private school. You know, maybe I would decide, okay, well if he doesn’t need to go to school for education, maybe we can do other things with that money.
Maybe the socializing aspect of youth is done. In another avenue. I mean, he goes to kung fu as well. Most kids play a sport or some sort of thing like that. Maybe they learn social skills in a setting that isn’t a school. If school’s not required for education and is required for socialization and advanced babysitting, maybe we call it something else.
Nick Johnstone: look, and I do think the fact that over time, the concept. Of gathering kids of the same age and putting them in It it, it actually doesn’t meet any sort of [00:25:00] evolutionary need. In humanity. I mean, if, if we go back to preschooling structures, um, kids learnt with a, with kids of various ages and perhaps a responsible adult in that context, guiding them or even checking in with them, and that would, that was in, in a village context. And I mean, I, I know that we don’t live in villages, but, uh, the reality is we, we create our own social connections. And those social connections may or may not include a traditional schooling structure. I, I think they will for quite some time, though. I think they will for at least another 20 or 30 years, because I think that that structure indoctrinated into our psyche now. I think if, I think if it had have been a, a rollover from the village to, to the industrial revolution that magically linked into the technological re revolution, [00:26:00] probably not. But we’re, we’ve, we’ve had, you know, multiple decades since the Industrial Revolution, which created schooling in order to, you know, generate a workforce of, you know, human robots. Um, but. That has changed over time with regard to what we’re teaching, how we’re teaching, um, how we’re evolving. We, we want the students to develop, you know, creative and critical skills. We want them to be part of their educational journey and buy into that, just, you know, rows of desks like you and I went to school with. Um,
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: a lot of schools don’t, don’t live in that paradigm
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: which is
Cameron: the skill that Fox, Fox goes to, you know, they don’t have rows of desks, you know? Yeah.
Nick Johnstone: mean, I, I, I have on purpose chosen to work, to work in and lead schools that aren’t, don’t have that philosophy and I wouldn’t.
Cameron: Mm
Nick Johnstone: but, um, I, I do think that that social community [00:27:00] I think humans crave, um, and I, and I think they crave that during that large social experiment of COVID was, was a good test case for
Cameron: Mm.
Nick Johnstone: Is,
a lot of time on their devices, but they really craved and they really miss that social connection. And from a school principal’s perspective, the kids couldn’t wait to come back and see and mingle with their friends
Cameron: Mm.
Nick Johnstone: and parents. developed a new, understanding of what it’s like to be a teacher.
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: the kids miss that social connection, that face-to-face social connection. But you’re right, that, so that that social connection doesn’t have to happen through a schooling model. Um, I, I will add another, um, caveat to that as well. in the, in the line of, um. Opportunities to, to connect [00:28:00] are, are really difficult. often in, uh. Cultures that aren’t connected. And I mean, as you, as you know, I’ve just been to, to and Portugal and visited. We’ve visited a number of schools in that context. I think we, this year and last year I visited 16 schools in Portugal and Spain and Southern France. And, um. on purpose, we visited, um, all different types of schools, you know, international schools, uh, public, uh, private village schools, inner city schools.
And, and in that, uh, context, I wanted to find out what it was like in those areas where they had. Monocultures compared to a really diverse community like we have in Australia and, and, and the US is the same. Um, it’s, it’s a, it’s a diverse, you know, everyone’s welcome. Let’s go. Uh, well it was, um, but um, that [00:29:00] it is different, the sense of community, the sense of connection, in those, in those monocultures. And they’re not all monoculture. I mean, there’s some, some of the towns like Vigo, that there’s about 50% immigration into that region. But the ones that were monocultures, it was a different vibe. There’s a different culture. There was a different social connection with the kids, with the parents, the kids with each other. There was no. Divides and in, in many schools that I’ve taught at that are, you know, 30, 40, 50%, um, immigrants, there’s, there’s pockets. Um, and if you, if you are an immigrant coming into a, into Australia and you don’t speak English, it’s very hard for you to be accepted into that context and therefore your children are experiencing that. often it takes decades or even
Cameron: Generational.
Nick Johnstone: to
Cameron: Yeah.
Nick Johnstone: you know, we, we grew up in Bundaberg and, and, um, the Italian kids that were cane farming generations, they were a couple of generations old, so they just fit in and we, [00:30:00] we didn’t even notice any difference, but their, their parents and their grandparents only
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: you know, met with other Italian families and, and so on.
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: so I think there’s a, that another complexity
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: complex environments like, like. You know, um, multicultural societies.
Cameron: So this leads me into the next question, which is the point of schooling in this future we’re talking about. So generally speaking, we send kids to school so they can get a job one day.
Nick Johnstone: Yeah.
Cameron: We want them to
Nick Johnstone: Well, that’s
Cameron: do primary school, do high school, go to university, I mean. Our kids, yours and mine don’t really, didn’t really go down the traditional job.
Path. My kids, uh, you know, Taylor [00:31:00] runs his own media empire and, and Hunter, um, is a talker, whatever that is, as a job. Social media influencer. You said what your kids do before, but. So, no. So really none of our kids benefited from their education whatsoever in a traditional sense to lead them to a job. Um, funnily enough, my adult boys, uh, recently got invited back to their high school Ferny Grove to give a talk to the Entrepre.
Class there about, you know, how to leave school and become an entrepreneur and do your own thing, which was interesting ’cause they had nothing nice ever to say about their high school. Uh, but then they got invited back and had to be nice. Um, say nice things. But you know, one of the big questions of course is, well, are there gonna be any jobs in the future?
And I’m already seeing this on Reddit. Uh, [00:32:00] people, uh, at university, whether they’re doing it or they’re studying psychology or they’re studying law, or they’re studying like accounting, um, there’s a whole range of people in the middle of their university studies going, well, I don’t think there’s any jobs waiting for me at the end of this because AI is gonna be taken.
20, 30, 40, 50% of the jobs. Microsoft did a study that we talked about on the last episode of this show a few weeks ago, uh, about all of the jobs that they think are gonna be the first to go with it. And it’s, you know, a lot of those professions. And I’m wondering, um, like what do you tell kids. Now, well, why am I learning this, Mr.
Johnson?
Nick Johnstone: good
Cameron: Um, you go, that’s what you say. Yeah. Good question. I, I dunno, I don’t dunno. I dunno what the point of this is[00:33:00]
anymore.
Nick Johnstone: Um, no.
Cameron: Yeah.
Nick Johnstone: I guess the first part of it is the, the role of schools and every, I mean, I, I, I’ve been in. Um, in schools a long, long time now, um, well over 30 years and every 10 years or so, know, uh, the police and some representatives from different systems get together and they push out another declaration of what the definition of education schools is. Uh, I guess probably the most, well, probably the seminal piece of work in that space was the Melbourne Declaration, which I can’t remember the year of. But it’s well over 10 years ago. Um, and the Melbourne Declaration basically said the purpose of schooling really is about creating connective connected and effective citizens. So whereas the previous declarations were about, creating, um, [00:34:00] literate, um. And well, basically creating a workforce. So it went from that workforce concept to being engaged citizens in their society. Now, I wouldn’t say I’m a skeptic, but you know, what does that really mean? And which, which society? Um, yeah.
get into that, but, um, I do think that. a lot to be said about, um, the tertiary sector being flipped on its head. You know, I, I visit quite a number of university campuses and compared to when, when I went to university, particularly my undergraduate degree, it was a hive of activity. And now are ghost towns most of the courses offer an online option, or they offer flexible buy-in buyout processes where it [00:35:00] might, you can come or you can watch the it online. Um, so university has become this. Part-time, virtual tertiary experience as opposed to a, what I thought was a fairly rich experience.
I actually enjoyed my university years. I enjoyed the learning, but I also enjoyed the social part of it, as well. Um, but now that the, those core numbers, even in the largest larger universities, don’t allow that same level of social engagement. for the universities to meet the market of what the learners wanted, actually taken away the entire experience for everyone. Um, which is sad I think, but maybe I’m just looking through rose colored glasses on my, um, time at university. I need to be practical. Um, but I do think we are moving towards a part-time workforce. Definitely. Um, and the stats have shown that every year there’s less and less people that are, [00:36:00] say full-time gainfully employed.
And I’m, I hate to use that term ’cause that doesn’t mean anything that says if you don’t have a full-time job, you’re not gainful. Um, but, you know, we, we would meet so many people that aren’t doing the traditional nine to five. Um, anymore and haven’t done for a long time. Um,
Cameron: I.
Nick Johnstone: exactly right. Uh, and my and my sons are exactly the same. And, and, and my son’s partners are exactly the same, you know. Uh, and
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: an a, a year and a half of his degree at QUT Brisbane, and he already knew that he was doing better work than the graduates.
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: asked him to do the university ad. So he did the media for the people that were wanting to come into the course, and he hadn’t even finished the course yet, know?
Cameron: I, you know, I think I’ve told you the story where my, I think it was Taylor that was doing a business in it at QUT, and he was, he’d done two years [00:37:00] and then his marketing professor said that he had a blog, but he couldn’t figure out how to get anyone to read it. And Taylor was like, why am I learning marketing from you if you can’t even market your own blog?
It’s, I’m out. And they,
out.
Nick Johnstone: my son will. Yeah, similar story. Um, yeah, so I
Cameron: But.
Nick Johnstone: of school around citizenship, but irony of that is. We actually don’t actively teach um, as a course or as a, a structure in our educational system. It’s kind of done through the values of the school and the activities of the school. So if our argument is that we create this. Model of education to build citizens. We’re not actually explicitly teaching what that means. Um, mean, yeah, in some states you can do [00:38:00] citizenship education, which is a course usually in year nine and year 10, and they push it into, you know, some different parts of the curriculum, but it’s not a course in itself or it’s not
Cameron: Quite frankly, that policy sounds to me like it was created by somebody in the PR department, right? We have to be seen to be saying certain things, but that’s, you know. Honestly, we’re pushing out employees. Morgan Stanley came out with a report just overnight that says that they believe AI will help. I think it’s American businesses save close to a trillion dollars.
Uh, I assume it’s a year in productivity, mostly by firing people. It’s $980 billion or something like that. They’re forecasting, I dunno, over what time period. I haven’t read the full report yet. I just read the, um, summation of it. So obviously those, those are jobs that won’t exist anymore. So again, uh, how do we, how do we motivate kids?
[00:39:00] Like my working premise at the moment from what I do? ’cause that could disappear. Um, Chrissy’s a viol ed teacher that’ll probably be around for a while. Um, but, you know, why should Fox get an education? My working premise is, look, we dunno, you just keep doing what you’re doing until you can’t do it anymore, until something changes and we figure out what the new world looks like.
But how do you do that with a bunch of kids? Like you’re gonna have kids in grade 10, 11, 12 saying, well, if there aren’t gonna be any jobs, what do I, what am I gonna do with my life? How do you handle that as a administrator?
Nick Johnstone: Yeah, it, it comes back down to the, to the notion of, I guess you want the kids, oh, you want them to have hope, one, without, without hope, you lose all motivation. So you, you want them to have hope lives. Um, and, but those hopeful lives don’t need to revolve around [00:40:00] paid employment. S you want the kids to be adaptable.
That’s another thing. And you know, everyone talks about resilience, but resilience is really around your ability to get, you know, um, chipped and you give yourself a good buffing. Uh, that that’s, you know, or how, how well you can ou back, uh, but world changes. It has always changed. Um, yes, I agree it’s changing at a faster pace, but I think if you
Cameron: Mm.
Nick Johnstone: you spoke to, you know, our grand grandparents’ generation who, you know, are born in the, in the young, you know, twenties and thirties, um, world is
Cameron: They saw a lot of change. My mom grew up on a farm outside of Bundaberg, didn’t have electricity until she was four years old. Now she has an AI on her smartphone. Like that’s insane amount of progress. That said, I do think it’s moving at a pace that in, in the next 10 years that is unimaginable,
Nick Johnstone: [00:41:00] adaptability
Cameron: giving.
So how do you teach that in a school? Like, um, I’m telling people, like teenagers that I talk to, just make sure you are as, um. Uh, across everything that’s happening as quickly as you can be, get really good, which is kind of what I’ve, I’ve sort of built my career out of, um, since I was at Aussie male, um, 30 years ago, which is being on the front foot of all technological innovation because I didn’t want to get left behind.
Is, is that sort of a message that you are imparting to kids? Be on the, be on the front foot, be on the cutting edge?
Nick Johnstone: Oh, uh, yes, totally be, be open to change. Be open for the opportunities that change provides.
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: ready to swoop in and take advantage of opportunities is a big one. And I know it’s probably oversold that the concepts and, [00:42:00] and traits of being an entrepreneur, but. That, that’s really about a mindset more than it is a set of to
Um, it’s
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: opportunities, whether it be companies, whether it be your own, um, uh, projects or inventions. But I do think. Almost gone of the, are the days where people will be working full-time jobs. And that nine to five thing, I think, you know, within five years be gone from a school’s perspective, um, as a workforce. I, I, I doubt in five, not in 10 years time, there won’t be too many full-time teachers. They just won’t. Happen anymore. And, and I think that will just be translocated across every different workforce. You might, you might be doing a couple of different things, or you might just be a teacher that works three days a week and maybe two of those days a week are at home. working with students, it’ll, it’ll just change remarkably. [00:43:00] Um, it, it’ll be those schools that adapt to that want and that need and that demand. That do that quickly. And um, education department schools outside of some lighthouse schools will be the last to that trend because of their bureaucratic structures. Um, the independent schools and the Catholic schools will be able to adapt to more quickly, in, in our Australian context. Um, so that. That’s, um, positive for the of high school kids that go to independent and Catholic education, but 60% still go to public schools. so I’m worried it creates this AI digital divide, even greater radar between even if AI is free.
Cameron: [00:44:00] Perhaps, but although I, the way I see it playing out is like, I dunno if you’ve seen this, but chat tea. Or open AI A couple of weeks ago, just about a week before they came out with chat GPT five, they introduced a new thing in chat GPT, which is study mode. Have you seen that? So I’ve used that with Fox a couple of times and introduced Tim to it, and for people that haven’t played with it yet, the difference between study mode and the regular mode is study mode doesn’t try and answer your questions as quickly as possible.
It steps back and it, it. Has the personality of a Tudor more, it’s like, okay, so tell me what you know so far and tell me what you’re struggling with. And it, it, it, it’s more of a pedagogical approach to ai, which is,
Nick Johnstone: for
Cameron: yeah.
Nick Johnstone: yeah.
Cameron: So I think we’re gonna see more and more of that where the AI will natively.
[00:45:00] Interpret your need and will come try. Its best to come at you based on what your requirements are. And so it’ll hopefully be taking kids and saying, looks like you’re struggling with this. Um, would you like some help? Would you like me to help you understand this more and more? But so I’m, I, I wanted to finish up Nick, uh, just by asking how your framing.
AI to your students, let’s say like older students, 10, 11, 12 grades. How are you framing AI at the moment and how are you integrating it or not into the curriculum and, and what sort of guidance or perspective are you providing the kids with the role that AI should, could, might play in their lives?
Nick Johnstone: Yeah. Um, it’s a good question. I, I’ll give two answers to that because, [00:46:00] um, I’ve been at my current school for 15 weeks, so I’ll, I’ll give you my answer from my last school, because we’d done a lot of work in the AI space. We’d, we’d involved, uh, student groups to present to staff on how they’re using. AI in their own world, both inside and outside of school. Um, we had a committee of, um, staff with those students involved in that, in d at different times to look at how we could, uh, I guess, leverage greater opportunities from an administration point of view, from a teaching and learning point of view. Um, from a governance point of view, how, how could we. Build that into our processes. And, and then we had the assessment side. and this comes back to that legislation component. We are required in New South Wales to follow the NSA guidelines about assessment, full stop. Nothing else we can do about that. have to follow that. So we had to have policies that meant the NSA guidelines for [00:47:00] assessment, but there were no Nessa guidelines. Um, for how we could use AI in our classroom teaching and learning context. then we had basically a think tank in presentations regularly back and forth with, with students and, and staff on how we could build that capacity over time. Very, very progressive, um, way of looking at it. And, and that school was very, very progressive in its mindset to ai. And see, we could, how we could amplify all components of schooling, obviously core being, teaching, and learning. Um, I’m 15 weeks into my, into my current school we’re, we are worried about, um, and I’m gonna say worried, we’re worried about the assessment process of year 11 and 12 assessment to make sure it’s valid, um, in that space. And I, I do also know that the Queensland assessment processes through the, through the government are also worried about that [00:48:00] process. I am less worried about that. And.
Cameron: What? What do you mean by assessment process is valid. Can you unpack that for me?
Nick Johnstone: So, um, a a a student needs to, uh, present work in, in class, they need to, um, submit an assignment. How, how much of that assignment is, is your own work now, I think the con that, that question is a lot more complicated than it sounds because I would argue that. No student is going back to, to first principles to gather work and, and to piece their ideas together. Um, that they’re currently using some sort of search engine. Most people live in Google Land still. Um, and, um, they, they’re gathering those pieces of work. They’re collating it together. They’re adding their own opinion on, onto it, and they’re justifying their, their reasons for that. Some high quality AI in that space already is, and will [00:49:00] continue to, I think, prompt students within the essay as they’re writing the essay. You know, have you thought about this? Ha, um, um, your justification for this looks a bit light on in blah, blah, blah, you know, like the, the deeper level questions, AI can be a lot more, and it doesn’t mean it’s not student work, it just, it’s asking, it’s prompting them to be
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: their ideas at a, as at a, as a deeper level.
And at the end of the day, we all want our kids to develop a. You know, a broad spectrum curriculum, but also have the depth of understanding on those areas. Um, and so I think AI can certainly have a massive role to play in supporting that. Growth of depth of learning. we’re in my current school, we are in early days in that process now, and that’s something personally, um, I would like to spend a lot of time on with, with [00:50:00] staff. Um, and I’ll be inviting, um, some different speakers to come in to talk to teachers and some students in that space. so you might get a phone call from me as well, by the way.
Cameron: Yeah, I, I accept, yeah. I, I, um, you know, I, Steve and I have talked about this before, but I’m interested in your perspective. A student running their essay through Chachi PT and getting suggestions for how to improve it. How, if at all, is that different from them having a private English tutor that they ran it past who gave them the suggestions?
Nick Johnstone: Cameron, that’s exactly the comments we made at the, at the committee at my last school is, is this any different? You, if you’ve got an English tutor and the English tutor is discussing the Macbeth essay that you’re writing, you know, um, um. I, is that any different to the classroom teacher giving you some feedback after after class?
Is it any different to, [00:51:00] to paying $120 an hour for a private tutor? I, I argue no, it’s not, it’s exactly the same. Um,
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: in fact AI
Cameron: And one is celebrated, like the, if you had a personal tutor, people would go, that’s fantastic. Great. You got the best parents ever. If you’re using ai, they’re going, oh, that’s horrible. You shouldn’t be using AI to improve your work. It’s, it’s weird dichotomy, right?
Nick Johnstone: is. And you know, and as, as you know, the, the benefit of that AI tutor means that they can be a Shakespearean
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: So they’re,
Cameron: Hmm.
Nick Johnstone: questions that are different depth that classroom teacher that probably has read plays, Shakespearean plays and has 15 or 20 years experience.
But they’re not a Shakespeare expert ’cause they can’t be.
Cameron: Yeah, you can’t be an expert on everything. So there’s, so, okay, so there’s a bunch of questions here, and I know we’re, we’re running outta time. Uh, you’re, you’re doing your next interview in 10 minutes, but there’s, uh. [00:52:00] There’s the question of how kids use it, whether they should use it, but it’s also how to use it well, so I, when I’m preparing research notes for one of my podcasts, whether it’s my investing show or a history show, or a politics show, the process I go through today is I write my notes, I then give my notes to chat GPT, and I say, fact check this.
And also. Challenge my interpretation of the facts. If you think I’m off, it will then give me its feedback. I then take all of that and I give it to Gemini or Grok or one of the other AI tools, and I say, fact, check this for me and also give me your position on the interpretation of the facts. So I’m comparing, I call it the Dave Double AI verification.
I go run it past Dave in my terminology, right? So it’s, I’m, I’m using the AI to [00:53:00] verify my work and each other’s work, and then trying to align. I go, well, hold on. Chachi PT Rock said. You were wrong on this. And it goes well. Yeah. Look, it’s, you know, there there’s different interpretations or different studies or different models and they go backwards and forwards.
So it’s, I, I feel like kids need, and adults too, need to be taught. Okay, yes, hallucinations are less of a thing today than they were a year ago, but there’s still a thing and bias is still a thing. Um, so how do you use the tools to.
Nick Johnstone: It’s a, it’s a
Cameron: Validate.
Nick Johnstone: we already go through the process with, with, with students, particularly those sort of in, in the secondary years around, h how are you justifying the conclusions you’re coming to and, and how are you referencing your work and what are your multiple sources?
Is this a primary sources, is this a secondary source, et cetera? Um,
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: [00:54:00] This is another layer of that. This is another layer of saying, okay, have you run this through, um, multiple processes using the appropriate, um, uh, prompts to cross reference, um, what you’ve said. Um, and look, I do the exact same process.
Cam, I, I, I use gr, I use Claude, I use chat GP T five, and, and I, I challenge one against the other.
Cameron: Mm-hmm.
Nick Johnstone: you know, I, I write my. Prompts in such a way that they even even compliment the, the other LLM in the process. really like what chat GPT had to say about this. However, this is another perspective club will say.
Cameron: That GPT says to me, well, of course GR would say that, wouldn’t it? You know, they have a very anti antagonistic relationship in my world.
Nick Johnstone: props have a lot more
Cameron: I. Oh, okay. Yeah, mine don’t, mine are very acerbic. Okay. [00:55:00] Well look, I know, uh, we’re running outta time, Nick, but, um, are there any final thoughts about AI in the future of education and the future of schooling and what that Venn diagram looks like that you would like to leave with our audience?
Nick Johnstone: Yeah. I, I would like to say that we’re, we are in a world of disruption. Everyone knows that we see it in every workplace. Um, that process. Is not complete. It’s continuous. Um, and the only guarantee in life is change fact. That’s the reality. So this is part of the change process we’re going through now, and I, and I ch challenge everyone regardless of their workplace, whether it’s in schools or it’s in, in business, just to be to the fact that change is reality. and it’s a mindset whether you. Adapt, uh, to it and get involved in it, or you don’t, and you [00:56:00] know, the consequences are starkly different. Um, so a choice.
Cameron: I’ve just launched, uh, in the last few weeks, my new consulting business, inte, which is my, which is AI consulting. And the question, you know, I think people are thinking about ai, but I think.
Nick Johnstone: I.
Cameron: The, the approach that most organizations are taking at the moment is, what can we do with ai? What I’m challenging organizations to think about is the question, what are the implications to our business or organization?
In a world where every student, every customer, every supplier, every employee, every competitor has access to unlimited intelligence in the palm of their hands. How does that change the nature of what we do? Uh, because I think those are the deeper questions that we need to be [00:57:00] thinking through.
Nick Johnstone: it’s, we’ve, will totally knowledge.
Cameron: Yes. Knowledge, not information. Google democratized information.
This act democratizes knowledge. It is different. Yes. Before you go, Alice Cooper’s new album with the old band. Uh.
Nick Johnstone: Love it.
Cameron: listened to it. When it came out. I was like, me, I’m not sure you wrote a glowing review and worthy of Rolling Stone forced me to go back and listen to it, and on subsequent listens, it’s growing on me.
Nick Johnstone: it, it does take a few lessons. Um, and look, as you well know, there are Alice Cooper albums that I don’t listen to.
Cameron: Really
Nick Johnstone: there’s a, there’s quite a few in
Cameron: easy action.
Nick Johnstone: no, I love easy action. Go back and listen to that.
Cameron: Right.
Nick Johnstone: to.
Cameron: I did just recently.
Nick Johnstone: with your jazz lens. Um,
Cameron: Yeah. Prog rock.
Nick Johnstone: oh man, I, I love it.
I love it [00:58:00] because it’s got these really strong undertones of, um, the original Alice Cooper group, but also Bob Ezrin and anyone that’s a rock and roll fan, it’s hard to not love Bob. Bob Ezrin. He’s, he for me changed 1970s rock and roll, and then we’re still feeling the
Cameron: Yes. Yeah. Big fan of Bob Ezrin. I nearly got to interview him once. Uh, when the, when the iPhone first came out, I was in San Francisco and there was a woman showing me her iPhone, and I was playing with it, and I was flicking through her contacts and seeing how the scroll works, and Bob Ezrin was in her contacts.
I was like. You know, Bob Ezrin, she said, you know who Bob Ezrin is? I’m like, lady Lou Reed. Alice Cooper Kiss. I mean, this guy was the man in the seventies. Uh, but she never set it up for me. Okay. And Ozzy. I mean, you and I used to sneak out of class in high school to go to your place to play pool and listen to Alice Cooper [00:59:00] albums when Constrictor came out.
Those things, I remember it was good times. Raise your fist and yell
Nick Johnstone: right.
Cameron: In the late eighties,
Nick Johnstone: I listened to Data again the other day. It’s a fantastic album. Yeah.
Cameron: we ran into each other when Alice was last in Brisbane. Just, just before COVID
early 2020.
Yeah. Yeah.
Nick Johnstone: um, days. Good days. Good fun.
Cameron: Yeah. All right. Thanks for, I’ll let you go, Nick. Thanks for coming on having a chat. That was, that was a lot of fun.
Nick Johnstone: Thanks Ken. Always great to see you. And uh, we’ll catch up soon for a coffee. Hey,
Cameron: Let’s do that all buddy.
Nick Johnstone: Bye.
[01:00:00]
