In the early morning hours of Jan. 7, Representative Kevin McCarthy, Republican of California, was elected speaker of the House on a 15th ballot, the longest such fight since before the Civil War. By October, however, he would already be ousted from that role.
Why did Mr. McCarthy eventually lose his speakership?
Our annual Contest Calendar is probably the single most powerful thing we publish all year. Teachers tell us they plan their classes around our challenges, and tens of thousands of teenagers across the globe participate by creating narratives, profiles, opinion pieces and reviews, podcasts, videos, illustrations and photo essays.
For us, these contests are an honor and a joy to host. We love learning from young people — about what moves them and makes them mad, what intrigues and confuses and delights and defines them.
Every summer, we tinker with our offerings to keep them fresh, and we’ve made some significant changes this time around.
To start, in August, The Learning Network will celebrate its 25th anniversary, and we’re marking it by running our first-ever challenge that is open to our full audience, both teachers and teenagers. We hope together you’ll help us tell a rich story about what it’s like to be in high school in 2023.
Like educators all over, we’ve been spurred by the advent of generative artificial intelligence to make creative tweaks to our offerings. This year, we’re putting more emphasis on the parts of the composing process that are, well, human. A glance at the 10 descriptions below might show you that elements like voice, point of view, reflection, making connections and building community are more central than ever. We’ve invented new contests and updated old ones, and we’ll be emphasizing process as well as product throughout. We also have a full writing curriculum to help support this work.
If you need a little encouragement to participate, we recommend two pieces. Students might start with “‘I Was Enough’: How I Stopped Trying to Sound Smart and Found My Genuine Writing Voice,” by a teenager who reflects on how our competitions helped her grow. If you are a teacher, our reader-submitted 10 Reasons to Send Student Work Out Into the World might be compelling — especially, perhaps, reason number 10.
To download a PDF version of this contest calendar, click here. Questions? Scroll to the bottom of this post to learn more, write to us at LNFeedback@nytimes.com or post a comment here.
Aug. 16-Oct. 4, 2023
What can you show or tell us that might help explain what it’s like to be an educator or a student in a secondary school right now?
We’re inviting you to contribute to a collective portrait of what it means to be in high school today, told by those living it.
All who work in any capacity in a secondary school, or are students over 13 in one, are invited to document, reflect and express themselves on any aspect, big or small, of their experience there. We want to know what’s hard, but we also want to know where and how you find meaning and joy.
As with our original Coming of Age contest — the blueprint for this effort — you can submit writing or images, audio or video. You can send us artifacts, such as photos from your camera roll, or create something new. And you can work alone or in a group, with others your age or across ages, roles and even schools. Each submission must be accompanied by a short artist’s statement.
Here are the contest rules and submission form, and here are 15 questions and a step-by-step guide that can help you brainstorm ideas.
Oct. 4-Nov. 1, 2023
Can you tell a meaningful and interesting true story from your life in just 100 words? That’s the challenge we posed to teenagers last fall with our 100-Word Personal Narrative Contest, a storytelling form popularized by Modern Love’s Tiny Love Stories. The answer, we discovered, was a resounding yes, so we’re bringing it back for Year 2.
Here are this year’s rules and guidelines. For more inspiration, read the work of last year’s winners, or follow this step-by-step guide for participating.
Nov. 1-Dec. 6, 2023
Review a book, movie, restaurant, album, theatrical production, video game, dance, TV show or art exhibition, with advice from New York Times critics to help.
To help you find content you will enjoy, we have also curated a collection of free links to over 75 pieces about young people published across sections of NYTimes.com this fall.
Jan. 10-Feb. 14, 2024
Following the example of the long-running Tip column from The New York Times Magazine, write a short description of how to do (almost) any task in 400 words or fewer.
As long as your topic is appropriate for a family newspaper, you can explain whatever you like, including tasks that Tip has already taken on. But you must find, interview and quote one expert on the subject throughout your piece.
We’ll be publishing more materials soon, but until then, check out both the Tip column and our lesson plan that breaks its formula down. For advice on finding topics and experts, read this piece from Times Insider about how the column is constructed.
Feb. 14-March 13, 2024
Inspired by the immersive New York Times series Where We Are, which focuses on young people and the spaces where they create community, we invite students to work alone or with others to make photo essays about the communities that interest them.
You can document any kind of offline community you like and feature people of any age. Then tell us about it by sending five to seven images with captions and a short introduction. Stay tuned for a related teaching guide, but to see some stunning examples, scroll through the series and explore pieces like this one about Black debutantes, this one about a Texas campus ministry, this one about band kids or this one about a Korean American youth camp.
Feb. 28-March 27, 2024
Produce a 15-second video about the meaning of one of our Words of the Day.
Here are last year’s rules and guidelines, which will stay the same except for one detail: You can work only with words published in our W.O.T.D. column after June 1, 2023.
For inspiration, take a look at the work of past winners.
March 13-April 17, 2024
Our Student Editorial Contest ran for a decade, and we received truly extraordinary work, but it’s time for a refresh. This year, we’re asking you to draw on the same skills and passions to make your case, but this time in the form of an open letter.
An open letter is a published letter of protest or appeal usually addressed to an individual but intended for the general public. Martin Luther King’s Letter From Birmingham Jail, the recent letter signed by over 1,000 tech leaders about the dangers of A.I. and this funny 2020 letter addressed to Harry and Meghan are all examples of this rich tradition.
Just as we did for the Editorial Contest, we invite you to make an argument in 450 words about something that matters to you, and persuade us that we should care, too. But this time, you must address yourself to a specific target audience or recipient, institution or group — one that has the power to make meaningful change.
Whether you choose your parents, teachers, school board members or mayor; a member of Congress; the head of a corporation; or a metonym like “Silicon Valley” or “The Kremlin,” ask yourself, What do I care about? Who can make changes, big or small, local or global, to address my issue or problem? What specifically do I want them to understand and do? And how can I write this as an “open letter,” meaningful not just to me and the recipient, but to a general audience?
More information will be published soon. Until then, you can find ideas and inspiration in our related writing unit and via the work of past Editorial winners.
April 17-May 15, 2024
Make an original podcast of five minutes or less that informs or entertains listeners.
Here are last year’s rules and guidelines, which will stay largely the same. For inspiration, listen to the work of past winners and visit the related writing unit.
June 7-Aug. 16, 2024
As we have for 14 years now, we’ll be asking you to tell us what got your attention in The Times and why. But this year, each week we’ll invite you to tell us in a different way.
What will that look like? Every Friday for 10 weeks, we’ll post a new invitation, like this one — except that some weeks, we’ll ask for written responses, while other weeks, we’ll ask for video, audio or visual reactions of some kind.
We’ll publish more details in the spring, but the essence of the contest will stay the same, as will most of the rules and guidelines. For inspiration, take a look at the work of past winners and the related writing unit.
All School Year
We invite students to react to the news via our daily writing prompts, and each week, we publish a selection of their comments in a roundup for the world to read. We will also give a shout-out to new schools that join the conversation.
Why do we run so many contests? We believe in student voice. We want young people to be active content creators, not just consumers. And we’re proud to offer places where they can create for an authentic audience of students, teachers, parents and other readers from around the world.
Here are more details:
The work students send us is always considered by our staff and other experts, including Times journalists, as well as educators from partner organizations or professional practitioners in a related field. Judging for our contests is blind. That means we see only the entries themselves, not student names or schools, when we make our decisions.
Winners get their work published on The Learning Network. Some may also be featured in a special section of the print New York Times.
Anyone who submits to our contests retains the copyright for the work, even after we publish it.
About two months after each contest closes, we’ll announce the winners, runners-up and honorable mentions. We usually celebrate dozens of students each time.
On the day each contest begins, we will add a link here, on this page, to the contest announcement so students and teachers can submit entries. All contests except Summer Reading begin and end on Wednesdays.
Students can enter as many contests as they want, but they can submit only one entry per contest. Our Summer Reading Contest, however, offers a fresh opportunity to submit each week for 10 weeks.
Students’ entries must be original and fundamentally their own. An entry must not be published elsewhere at the time of submission, including in a school newspaper, on a radio station’s website or in a literary magazine.
All of our contests are open to students around the world ages 13 to 19 who are in middle school or high school, except “What High School is Like in 2023,” which is open only to secondary students. College students cannot submit entries. However, high school students (including high school postgraduate students) who are taking one or more college classes can participate. Students attending their first year of a two-year CEGEP in Quebec can also participate. In addition, students ages 19 or under who have completed high school but are taking a gap year or are otherwise not enrolled in college can participate. Note: The children and stepchildren of New York Times employees are not eligible to enter these contests, nor are students who live in the same household as those employees.
Want to make sure you never miss a contest announcement? Sign up for our free weekly newsletter, or follow us on Twitter and Facebook.
We can’t wait to see what you’ll create this year!
On Wednesday, Jan. 10, teachers from our collaborator, the American Statistical Association, will facilitate this discussion from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Eastern time.
5. By Friday morning, Jan. 12, we will reveal more information about the graph, including a free link to the article that includes this graph, at the bottom of this post. We encourage you to post additional comments based on the article, possibly using statistical terms defined in the Stat Nuggets.
We’ll post more information here on the afternoon of Thursday, Jan. 11. Stay tuned!
More?
• See all graphs in this series or collections of 75 of our favorite graphs, 28 graphs that teach about inequality and 24 graphs about climate change.
• View our archives that link to all past releases, organized by topic, graph type and Stat Nugget.
• Learn more about the notice and wonder teaching strategy from this 5-minute video and how and why other teachers are using this strategy from our on-demand webinar.
• Sign up for our free weekly Learning Network newsletter so you never miss a graph. Graphs are always released by the Friday before the Wednesday live moderation to give teachers time to plan ahead.
• Go to the American Statistical Association K-12 website, which includes teacher statistics resources, Census in the Schools student-generated data, professional development opportunities, and more.
Students 13 and older in the United States and the Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public.
What’s coming up this year that you’re excited about? An important birthday, celebration or personal milestone? A trip you’re planning? A friend who is coming to visit? A class you’re taking? Something you plan to make? A TV show or movie that’s coming out soon? Anything at all can go on your list.
Tell us in the comments, then read a related article, about what Times culture critics are most looking forward to, to learn more.
Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public and may appear in print.
Do you ever compare yourself with others — peers, friends, family, celebrities, people on social media? Do you ever wish you had something someone else has, such as their status, success or talent?
Envy is one of the seven deadly sins — but can it ever have an upside? Does envy fill you with unhelpful feelings of resentment and despair, or does it motivate you to work harder?
In “How to Make Envy Work for You,” Jancee Dunn writes about the benefits of feeling that others have it better than you do:
I have an acquaintance whom I’ve followed for years on social media — even though most of her posts fill me with envy. She always seems to be on a different tropical vacation. How many beaches can a person visit?
When I showed my husband her latest post from the dunes, he suggested I unfollow her.
“It’s not that easy,” I told him.
“It actually is,” he said.
Envy, the feeling you get when you perceive that someone is better off than you, is something many of us can recognize, said Robert Leahy, director of the American Institute for Cognitive Therapy and a professor of psychology at Weill Cornell Medical College, who researches envy. But we often feel both shame and guilt, he said.
“In pop psychology, people might say you should never have any envy,” Dr. Leahy said. “That’s absurd. You’re human.”
Ms. Dunn talked to experts about how to make the tendency to “compare and despair” work for us. The first strategy she discovered was to “acknowledge it”:
If you feel a surge of envy, first, own up to it, Dr. Leahy said. “Making room for envy and noticing when it shows up allows people not to be afraid of it.”
It’s OK if you envy a friend, Dr. Leahy said. Your emotions are likely more complex. “You can think, I love my friend, I appreciate what they do for me and their good qualities, and I envy them,” he said. “You don’t have to reduce your thoughts or emotions about a person to envy.”
Don’t react to envy impulsively, said Manuel Gonzalez, an assistant professor of psychology at Montclair State University, who has studied envy. Instead, explore what you are fixating on when you feel envious, he said. What issues does it bring up in your own life?
Use that information to clarify your own desires and ambitions, Dr. Gonzalez said. Then, he said, ask yourself: Why do I envy this person? How can I use this person as a role model? What can I learn that can change my own situation?
Students, read the entire article and then tell us:
What role does envy play in your life? How often do you compare yourself with others and lament that they are better off than you?
Tell us about a time when you envied someone else. What triggered your feelings? What did you learn, if anything, from the experience?
What aspects of the article resonate with you? Do you ever feel “hijacked” by envious thoughts, making you depressed, angry or overwhelmed? Do you ever feel “guilt and shame” and try to hide your resentments? Or do you try to acknowledge your feelings and find motivation in them?
Research has found that young adults are more envious than older adults. Are you surprised to learn this? Have your experiences with envy changed over the course of your life? Do you expect envy to be part of your adulthood? If so, to what degree?
The article provides several strategies for turning envy to your advantage. For example, Dr. Gonzalez recommends asking yourself: “Why do I envy this person? How can I use this person as a role model? What can I learn that can change my own situation?” What do you think of that advice? What advice would you give to others to help them channel their feelings of envy into something positive?
Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public and may appear in print.
Find more Student Opinion questions here. Teachers, check out this guide to learn how you can incorporate these prompts into your classroom.
It’s the start of the new year, a time when many recommit to healthy habits. But instead of asking you what you’d like to start doing, we’re asking what you already do to make yourself feel better.
For instance, do you regularly stretch? Write in a journal? Eat a balanced diet? Make time for family and friends? Manage your screen time?
Tell us what works for you and why, then read a related article from the Well section, or join their 6-Day Energy Challenge.
Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public and may appear in print.
The word dhow has appeared in three articles on NYTimes.com in the past year, including on Oct. 5 in “U.S. Sent Munitions Seized From Iran to Ukraine” by Eric Schmitt:
The U.S. military’s Central Command said in a statement on Wednesday that earlier this week it had transferred about 1.1 million rounds for Soviet-era machine guns and rifles seized from Iran to Ukraine’s armed forces.
Allied naval forces seized the munitions in December, according to the statement, from a “stateless dhow” — essentially an unregistered wind-powered vessel — sailing to Yemen. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps was sending the munitions to Houthi rebels in Yemen in violation of a United Nations Security Council resolution barring such transfers, the statement said.
Can you correctly use the word dhow in a sentence?
Based on the definition and example provided, write a sentence using today’s Word of the Day and share it as a comment on this article. It is most important that your sentence makes sense and demonstrates that you understand the word’s definition, but we also encourage you to be creative and have fun.
If you want a better idea of how dhow can be used in a sentence, read these usage examples on Vocabulary.com. You can also visit this guide to learn how to use IPA symbols to show how different words are pronounced.
If you enjoy this daily challenge, try our vocabulary quizzes.
Students ages 13 and older in the United States and the United Kingdom, and 16 and older elsewhere, can comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff.
The Word of the Day is provided by Vocabulary.com. Learn more and see usage examples across a range of subjects in the Vocabulary.com Dictionary. See every Word of the Day in this column.
I was curious to know who the first person was to say, “Happy New Year.” I reached out to GPT-4 and learned that nobody really knows (bummer), and that it was celebrated over 2,000 years ago, but nobody said that wordage, and that it was tied to the Gregorian calendar in the 16th century. Considering that 2,000 years ago, the Gregorian calendar didn’t exist, for all we know, New Year’s Day could have been March the 5th. I bring all of this up, because when doing a forecast, it isn’t an exact science. It is based on trends (from my perspective) and what you see, moving forward in that year. Experience plays a role, and just seeing all the “data” screaming this is what this is, and saying to yourself, why isn’t anyone else seeing the same thing?
Some forecasts are pretty simple to figure out. Others not so much. In 2023, I never saw generative AI coming – nor did the majority of folks who forecast whatever. Machine Learning was well-known (it’s another form of AI), so the idea that generative AI, in this case, ChatGPT would take off (even though Gen AI was already out there), definitely a surprise.
What didn’t surprise me though, once it started to catch everyone’s attention, was that vendors in the learning system and learning tech space, would grab hold of it. I figured out early on, where the low hanging fruit was for vendors who wanted to add it. Course creation tools (aka built-in authoring tools) was pretty obvious, assessment, and even skills based on X factor or factors. The first two rolled out quickly – for those who dove in. The skills is very early, and the other one, that I thought would zing out would be around the creation of learning paths/learning journeys.
For Learning Tech, solutions such as Lucy.ai (which was around prior to 2023) didn’t surprise me. While I see a lot of pluses it is still missing some items. And the idea that it is private generation ai, is a misnomer. Once you link out to say LinkedIn (which Lucy.ai has a partnership with), the whole private thing goes out the window. Nevertheless, I did find Lucy.ai as a solid solution.
Bongo Learn rumbled out with their ai coaching offering, and then improved it by tying the generative ai to skills validation/assessments, coaching, and other items with data presented. The moment I saw it, I was “this is a winner,” – which is why it was named the number one Learning Tech solution for 2023.
Forecast 1
Generative ai explodes in the learning system space (and learning tech for that matter, but I’m focusing here on learning systems). There were vendors in 2023, who are typically known for slogging when it comes to adding NexGen features quickly. Let alone, adding any features. Yet, those vendors rumbled with generative ai, and I’d argue with mixed results. Some useful, others, been there, seen it already.
I’d estimate that less than 1% of the total learning system space, rolled out with some level of generative ai in 2023. Thus, my forecast is that nearly 40% of the entire space will have generative ai by the end of the year. I’m not including open source 100% freebies in the list though – simply because a 3rd party dev shop could add gen ai, when the open source itself doesn’t offer it.
Why the high number? It is essential with any system – first, there is a demand in the market – due to hype, and messaging that this could be a game changer – secondly, while the usual statement of “our clients aren’t asking for it OR none of our prospects are asking for it,” won’t apply – due to perception that if you do not have it, you are behind, and thus not forward thinking. No vendor wants to be seen as being behind the times, or archaic in their thinking. Who wants to purchase that?
Thirdly, gen ai is being added by companies, organizations and businesses – the same folks who are clients or will be for a vendor. It doesn’t look well, when they have it, and the vendor doesn’t.
Lastly, if I am a competitor, I would message I have it, and market it to the tilt – and if my competitors don’t, then I would compare and note that – in a nice marketing way, tapping into neuromarketing and propaganda techniques (both of which work).
No, there is too much there, to ignore. Hence the high percentage. Now, will it be good? Will it be universal in what vendors do with it? Will it make sense to add it here vs there? The answer across the board is highly unlikely. Some vendors will get to the next stage, others will be starting out, and even others who already launched, will be required – in fact, necessarily to do more – after all, they started in 2023.
There will be vendors who hype and use certain words to enhance what they offer – I see this already with one vendor who notes they have copilots in their system. Sounds great, but is it fully accurate? No.
Another vendor mentioned they were the first AI learning system (actually a couple of vendors mentioned this too). Was the one who heavily pushed the messaging truly #1? No. Neither were the others by the way – but what works, works. And then there was a vendor messaging they have Skills tied to AI already, but never noted that in fact, they didn’t yet – in 2023, rather it was rolling out in Q1 2024.
Thus, you can expect plenty of this, wild west approach in 2024. Unless you fully understand what a copilot is, what is the vendor referring to regarding AI – it could just be machine learning, how is gen ai being used in the system – show me, and find out if it is actually live, and so forth, you may experience a surprising number of vendors who say one thing, but reality is something else.
For me, I would have been a vendor who waited until 2024 to start. There are so many LLMs (learning language models – the foundation for gen ai), selecting one without fully exploring the entire market – beyond the big names – could be a mistake. Plus, I would select two LLMs, not just one.
I do believe that within this forecast, the majority of vendors will go with Open AI – which already is the #1 choice by vendors who rolled out in 2023. Even those who went Azure AI – it is really Open AI – and specifically here, ChatGPT 3.5 Turbo. GPT-4 has more capabilities, than 3.5 but the token fees are higher. GPT 4 Turbo (it’s often mentioned as 4.5) is not yet available (as of 1-2-2004) for commercial use.
The vendors I see in play beyond say ChatGPT, again by OpenAI are the following. Yu can go the fine-tuning route and access them as an API. For example, thru Azure AI studio, you can do this with Llama 2, and many other LLMs. To use Amazon Bedrock, or Q, or Titan (yuck) you must have AWS.
Others to consider – intriguing, but a lot of vendors haven’t heard of all of them
I note all of the above, because the forecast #2, will continue to show the driver in our industry, being OpenAI, and whichever version learning system vendors (even learning tech – Lucy.ai for example, uses OpenAI), go this route. One reason I have heard is that OpenAI is easy to work with, structures good pricing and works well for what the vendors need.
Azure AI will be right in there, but again it’s really the Open AI GPT versions. I do hope that folks really take a dive with Bedrock, but I just believe the foothold with GPT 3.5 and 4 is strong to retain.
Forecast 3
Yep, still on generative ai (it’s the dominate player here for feature sets). Here is what I see as the key capabilities that vendors will use (or at least rollout for 2024, to begin with)
There is one vendor who plans on developing personal agents that learners can select from to help them, learn. Will it roll out in 2024? They say it will, but while their approach is to have the personal agents – autonomous agents – an ideal for folks to use – it will sit on another platform and then folks pick the one(s) they want. My preference is to have the agents in the system itself. A personal agent – is in essence a copilot. That’s the simplest way to think about them.
Vendors may start to rollout gen ai on the learner side. I expect to see some do this. The risk? High token fees, depending on what gen ai LLM they are using, and number of users. While you may think a half a cent isn’t that expensive, wait until you have 25,000 people entering questions and other text items into the context window (folks will say prompt, but it actually is context). If you can add a PDF or another file, or generate synthetic materials, hello pricing. As of right now, fees are quite low with a vendor, because it is on the admin side, and course creation and assessment tools are not that expensive.
Pricing for gen ai? There are three approaches – one – is include it for free – there are vendors who offer it. However, each of them have said, they will need to watch around usage, and cost to them – the vendor – to decide if they need to charge. Other vendors charge it as an add-on – a flat price. I know of two vendors who is going with the token credits approach, whereas you buy a set number of tokens, and then your end users, well, use them, plus whatever the admin does.
Which will end up the most popular? Hard to say right now, but free I think won’t be the option here – especially when the costs of usage based on users and what they enter in the context window goes up. The problem here is that folks tend to start off by asking ambiguous questions or information, rather than going very specific. Thus, the start high then narrow – which increases token fees – because a token fee is based on the number of characters.
The token credit option, I think could work – as long as the client fully understands how it works. Think a bucket of tokens. The add-on though, will likely be the leader here.
Forecast 4
Advanced analytics – I call them learning intelligence – will increase. The downside? The vendors who offer it, do so as an add-on (you likely will see it as just a line item in the proposal). The problem with learning intelligence data out of the box – i.e. it comes with the system, overwhelmingly is awful. You couldn’t figure out your learning story. Some vendors include a built-in BI tool, as the metrics. The downer here is that this is a business intelligence angle, not really a learning intelligence angle. Sure, you can generate a lot of metrics, but it can get confusing, and you really need to know what is relevant and what isn’t.
Forecast 5
Refreshed UI/UX. This is definitely on the plate. The downside? Vendors focus on the learner side. Great, and yes, you need to, but the folks who are in the system the most? Administrators. I see way too many systems who haven’t done an update in years. And I’m talking years.
Forecast 6
LXP hype continues. Ignore the hype. Nearly everyone pitches LXP, but there are only a handful that are legit LXPs. And any vendor who says that an LXP is the content angle, whereas the LMS is about course management – clearly has no clue on an LMS, and why it was built and its structure. It is frustrating for me, to see how many vendors never did their homework or background understanding.
Forecast 7
Skills continues to be hot, especially around content tied, and upskilling. The problem here? Reskilling has to become number one, because gen ai is going to eliminate jobs. Sure, there will be new jobs – hence the reskilling aspect. The latest to get hit – or projected to – on job loss? Accounting.
Equally data is pointing that the people that will be impacted the most with job loss around gen ai? Mid-managers.
Thus, reskilling again, has to be the priority. However, I believe the vast number of clients – i.e. the folks who oversee L&D, HR, or Internal Training or whatever department are not thinking that way. Which is going to be a issue. Think this way, Fred is eyeing a marketing role – or the system eyes it that way. However, that marketing position will be eliminated due to gen ai. What will you do now? This is why, the people overseeing L&D, HR, Training, etc. must stay current with what roles will be eliminated. It isn’t as simple as you think.
Let’s not forget that gen ai, and ai in general is still at tiny, miniscule level. And that if you are relying on it solely for productivity without a human, that is a big no no. Yet, companies are seeing it that way, forgetting that all LLMs produce hallucinations (fake or false information). How many folks in L&D, Training, HR, or other departments are aware of this? How many of your employees are aware of this?
My guess, not a lot. So, a cut and paste seem simple, but what if that productivity or task impacts the company, say financially data? Not realizing that the info could be false, and then publishing up the food chain, whereas those folks are unaware is a legit risk.
Bottom Line
Generative ai – will be the number one capability for 2024. Nothing is even close. It will go across many areas of the system, and yet, one of the biggest low hanging fruit with it, isn’t even on vendor’s radar (it is for me).
This is why I write a lot around generative ai. Your employees will have no real idea on its impact and what they need to realize and do. This is directly do to no one in L&D, HR, Internal Training or other departments providing online content/courses that specify exactly. If you are not pushing out the content, heck in this case, making it required (yes, I said it), and getting the metrics behind it, you are going to regret it. The company will regret it. Generative AI, in any Enterprise isn’t a freebie with token costs. And as someone in a department overseeing an Learning System, and the training and learning too, it isn’t as easy as to prepare as you might think.
The learning system vendors, for the most part, will ignore the RED ALERTS that are needed in the system – such as clearly letting learners and admins know that gen ai may produce fake or false information and that you must always check to verify it is correct. So far, I’ve seen only two systems do this, and one, has the text so small, you need a microscope to read it.
No one, has added context windows on the admin side, where the person can identify if the information is correct or not. Gen AI is based upon patterns and training itself. Thus, unless the person (even on the learner side) can verify the information is correct, the system – i.e the LLM will think it is so and continue to build upon that. Think how that will play with your learning, for skills or content or assessments or coaching or cohorts and so on.
This is simple 101 stuff here. Which begs the question – why hasn’t anyone done it in their system?
I suspect it is like the person who started “Happy New Year.”
They had no idea they would be the first one to do so, nor did they expect it to take off, more than 400 years later. If they knew that there may be issues with it, or that if everyone thinks that is the right and appropriate terminology to use, I wonder if they would have said it?
Perhaps, perhaps not.
I mean, we will never know who that person was.
And maybe that is the secret to saying Happy New Year,
Even if they thought the new year was
March 1st.
E-Learning 24/7
Learning to code so that you can land a job in tech can feel daunting. That’s why we’re sharing inspiring stories from Codecademy’s community — to show how people like you (yes, you!) can embark on a learning journey and end up with a totally new career. We hope these stories serve as a reminder that there’s no single path to a more fulfilling work life.
Today’s story is from Pj Metz, a 38-year-old Developer Community Manager at ProjectDiscovery, an open-source security startup, living in San Mateo, California. Read more stories from Codecademy learners here — and be sure to share your story here.
“I was a high school English teacher for 11 years. I loved it, and it had its challenges, of course. Number one being teaching in Florida doesn’t pay. The pandemic hit at the beginning of the last quarter of school, and my friends got together on Zoom and did these happy hours. I had a friend who worked at Red Hat who told the group he found out he was being underpaid by $50,000 a year. I remember being really shocked because my base salary was less than that.
Another friend said privately, ‘Pj, I do this job called Developer Relations or DevRel and essentially, I teach people how to use products. I think you’d probably be really good at it.’ And I said, ‘Well, I don’t know how to code. I write poetry and I teach Shakespeare — that’s what I’m good at.’
He said, ‘What are you up to this summer?’ And I go, ‘Nothing, I’m wiping down groceries and being afraid to talk to people.’ He sent me this video by Scott Hanselman about C#. I watched it and took notes while I was reading it, and then I found the rest of the 14 videos in the series.
A couple of weeks later, I went back to my friend, and I was like, ‘Hey, what else do you have? I watched all the videos already.’ And he goes, ‘Oh, I don’t know.’ So we set up a plan, I started researching, and that’s when I found Codecademy.”
“My friend Brandon said, ‘You should stream yourself. Then you’ll have this repository of information and learning that you’ve done live on Twitch, and other people will come and help you, too.’ The plan became: I spent about four to five hours a day on Codecademy learning some C#. On Sundays, I would stream with Brandon building a website.
When the school year started, my schedule was packed because I was teaching AP for the first time, I was the Drumline Instructor for the marching band, and still trying to code. Sundays we were still streaming, but during the school week I could only do Codecademy at lunch.”
“My wife and I were teachers, so we had to be very careful with money. When I looked at Codecademy, I was like, Well, I could do a bootcamp and it’s $12,000. I could find courses at my community college and pay for those. But I’ve got nothing to do this summer. I just decided to buy Codecademy Pro, because it was 40 bucks a month at the time.”
Codecademy Pro helps you gain job-ready skills at a fraction of the cost. Learn more here.
“At first, I didn’t know if a career change was actually possible, but I knew that if I kept working at it, something fun would happen. Brandon introduced me to someone named Chloe Condon who worked at Microsoft as a Developer Advocate. She and I started hanging out on streams too. We started making Twitter bots together, and that’s when I started learning JavaScript.
Around November, I get the idea to make this a career change. I decided that this will be my last year teaching, and at the end of this school year, I’ll start getting a job. Chloe and I started streaming a show called The Show Must Go Off the Air. The whole point was we wanted to get the show canceled by getting me a job. The show was literally us just hanging out, and she would walk me through job applications.
In late February, someone from a fintech company reached out to me, saying they were hiring for their first Developer Relations role. I go through the process, and I get an offer, and I sign it on a Saturday, and on Monday, I put in my two weeks at school. I didn’t expect to leave in the middle of the school year, but for the money they were offering, I was like, ‘Okay, absolutely.’
Monday night, the company emails me and tells me that they’re rescinding the offer. They just said, ‘We’re no longer going to have this role.’
I’m like, ‘What am I going to do?’ I can’t just go start working at another school out of nowhere. I was thinking maybe I could pick up substitute teaching somewhere. But are they going to want someone who quit their last teaching job for apparently no reason? I remember looking at my wife saying, ‘I have two months and we breakeven on money.’ I took the weekend to get myself together and I started making a plan.”
“My mentor Chloe was helping me make a plan as well, she’s like, ‘Recruiters are in my inbox all the time. I’m just going to pass them to you.’ I keep working on web development, taking whatever courses I can find on Codecademy. I took a technical writing course, and just did anything I could to make myself marketable.
Now I have a list of people to reach out to from Chloe. My day was spent messaging people on Twitter: ‘Hi, I’m Chloe’s mentee. I heard that you might be interested in chatting with me. Here’s what I’m working on. I’m trying to build a portfolio.’ I’m trying to show off my GitHub and be like, ‘Look, these are Codecademy exercises that I imported into GitHub. I know what I’m doing.’
About a month into it, I literally picked up an application to Dunkin Donuts near my house because I was about to start needing money immediately. That same day, GitLab reaches out and says, ‘We’re hiring a position that we’re calling Education Evangelist. Essentially, you’d be a part of our DevRel team, but you would be focused on students and teachers.’”
“I couldn’t contain myself. I told the recruiter, ‘This is going to sound cocky, but this job is written for me. I’m who you’re looking for.’ And I got it.
I was able to point to specific skills they were looking for from the job application and show specific ways I had accomplished those tasks and could prove those skills.”
If you’re learning something new and you’re not confused by it, you didn’t learn anything new.
Pj Metz
Developer Community Manager at ProjectDiscovery
“There was a big adjustment, because when I was a teacher, my life was dictated by bells, and I just did the same thing on repeat. Now it was like, here’s your eight-hour day; what I spend it on is my choice.
From then on, it was learning GitLab. I didn’t have to write any code for my job, but I needed to know how to read a lot of it. We write things in YAML, and we do a lot of static websites. I needed to brush up on HTML again and make sure I’m familiar with that. Anytime I had something new to do, I said, ‘What does Codecademy have in its catalog that could help me here?’”
“I wish I knew that failure isn’t an end, it’s a step. It feels so bad to not understand. I remember the section on C# methods. I stumbled through it; I was clicking hints and ‘View solution’ all the time. I remember getting to the end of it and just feeling like I don’t actually understand methods at all. A month later, I went to do it again. I erased my progress, went back, and did it one more time. That’s when it started to click.
If you’re learning something new and you’re not confused by it, you didn’t learn anything new. You already knew it. So you have to embrace that confusion. At first, I was like, ‘I don’t get this. What if I never get it?’ You will — it’s just going to take time.”
Not sure where to start? Check out our personality quiz! We’ll help you find the best programming language to learn based on your strengths and interests.
Want to share your Codecademy learner story? Drop us a line here. And don’t forget to join the discussions in our community.
Has the New Year inspired you to make any changes to your habits and routines? If so, what are your plans and what do you hope to accomplish? Are the changes meant to improve your life? Do you think other people will be affected positively by your resolutions?
In the Opinion essay “This Year, Make a Resolution About Something Bigger Than Yourself,” Roger Rosenblatt writes about what the new year means, and the opportunity it presents to think about how we use our time. He writes:
We reflect on the years we’ve lived, on the past resolutions made and broken. Another New Year’s Eve come and gone. Every time the ball drops, the heart sinks. You are running out of time, and time is what we value most.
The historian-philosopher Lewis Mumford believed that the clock, not the steam engine, was the principal machine of the industrial age because time has a commanding relationship to the expenditure of human energy, and thus to any product itself. From the start, the essence of industry has been that things run on time. Time touches everything in life, even love. The fundamental things apply.
Thus there is always a melancholic desperation and urgency when we shout, “Happy New Year!” Will this new year, in fact, be any better than the last? We resolve that it will. We resolve to be fitter, healthier, cleverer, richer, more successful, more popular, more productive, better dressed, happier. And so restarts the whole vain, foolish, inevitably disappointing cycle.
The trouble with all such self-oriented promises is that they deal in chicken feed. What does the great wide world care if you lose weight, or work out, or work harder, or quit drinking or smoking?
Quit smoking or smoke three packs a day. Work out daily or let yourself go. It’s your choice, your life. Your little life. Meanwhile, the world — the whole tortured, self-destructive, polarized, endangered, extraordinary world — spins on.
What if, instead of planning our exercise regimens, we focused our intentions on all that is undesirable in human activity — wars, bigotry, brutality, the despoiling of the earth — and sought to address it? What if instead of making a milquetoast resolution, we made airtight commitments?
He also suggests that in trying to make the world a better place, we start small:
The task of improving the world may seem impossible, but it isn’t. All it takes is the proper sequence of correct discrete decisions. Decisions are just resolutions with teeth.
An editor of mine told me a story from his childhood on his grandparents’ farm in Iowa. The little boy, looking out over acres and acres of corn, asked his grandfather, “How are we going to shuck all that corn?” His grandfather said, “One row at a time.”
This, too, is how to improve the world. And we can start small.
Personally, I vow that I will frequently visit a children’s hospital and try to distract kids with stories, the funnier the better. I vow that I will phone every lonely person I know — and there are plenty — at least twice a week, just to chat and make them feel part of the living world. I vow to give alms to everyone who asks, and to those who don’t, and to stand up for the stupid and crazy, the stupider and crazier, the better. I promise to keep an eye out for strays (cats, dogs and people) and bring them safety and comfort. I vow to see every wrong as a menace, every wound an opportunity.
What will you do — right now, this week, this month — to make a better world? Stage a protest. Send a letter to right a wrong, or to proffer friendship. (A thoughtful, sympathetic letter to a friend in sorrow or distress is a powerful thing.) Lend a hand. Offer a word of comfort or inspiration or support or love. Donate money or, most valuable of all, time. There are so many ways to move this world, right within reach.
Students, read the entire essay and then tell us:
What experiences have you had with New Year’s resolutions? Have you ever made any that led to lasting changes in your habits? Have you ever given up on a resolution?
How do you feel after reading Mr. Rosenblatt’s essay? Do you agree that the most worthwhile resolutions are the ones that aim to improve the world and not just ourselves? Why, or why not?
Mr. Rosenblatt writes, “Time touches everything in life, even love.” What does that mean to you? How is this statement relevant to his argument that a new year is a good time to establish the practice of trying to improve our world?
You read about the farmer who said to shuck acres and acres of corn by doing it “one row at a time.” Does this remind you of a time when you had to do something difficult or time consuming? Can you apply this advice to anything in your life, like a school project or college applications?
What is one action you can take right now that has the potential to benefit another person or perhaps a whole group? What will it take to make that happen? Do you need anyone else’s help? How will you take the first step?
Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public and may appear in print.
Find more Student Opinion questions here. Teachers, check out this guide to learn how you can incorporate these prompts into your classroom.
