I'm taking courses at my local college (heavy duty diesel tech) and I'm finding how little use the teachers is for me. I got a digital copy of the textbook, and downloaded all the courses notes, pumped that into claude and made a discord bot that generates me quizes, tracks all my progress, and builds me a study guides off the results.
Superior to any teacher I've ever had, no matter how involved they are. I genuinely don't even see what my teacher is needed for beyond a requirement for me to be there. I can ask the bot "can you clarify X section" at 3am and it'll do in 1 second. In class, the teacher reads the slides, adds some extra points and takes questions. But my bot does all this, completely personalized to me.
Times move on, and I don't see teachers surviving. I'm hoping by next year the college will offer an "at home, self paced course" option. Theres no reason for me to be there.
AI is moving fast, so I'm very open to the suggestion that Claude can do today what it couldn't six months ago. But my experience with folks who are learning from AI, historically, has been that they have high confidence in abilities they are not able to demonstrate when asked to show mastery through conventional problem solving.
I do, all the time. I get test, do good and then the college signs off that Im a certified mechanic when Im done.
Maybe its more of a critique on the school, but no one tests you on your ability to disassemble an engine and rebuild it. They simply make you write a test based off terms you learned in a textbook.
This was exactly my experience in high school, university, and now the same in college.
I would of killed for this bot during my math courses in university.
> no one tests you on your ability to disassemble an engine and rebuild it. They simply make you write a test based off terms you learned in a textbook
Out of curiosity, where–geographically–are you going to school?
If you're able to pass you theoretical tests without AI, it's fair to say you're learning what's being tested.
Ralo · · focus · HN ↗
Superior to any teacher I've ever had, no matter how involved they are. I genuinely don't even see what my teacher is needed for beyond a requirement for me to be there. I can ask the bot "can you clarify X section" at 3am and it'll do in 1 second. In class, the teacher reads the slides, adds some extra points and takes questions. But my bot does all this, completely personalized to me.
Times move on, and I don't see teachers surviving. I'm hoping by next year the college will offer an "at home, self paced course" option. Theres no reason for me to be there.
JumpCrisscross · · focus · HN ↗
Have you independently verified your learning?
AI is moving fast, so I'm very open to the suggestion that Claude can do today what it couldn't six months ago. But my experience with folks who are learning from AI, historically, has been that they have high confidence in abilities they are not able to demonstrate when asked to show mastery through conventional problem solving.
Ralo · · focus · HN ↗
I do, all the time. I get test, do good and then the college signs off that Im a certified mechanic when Im done.
Maybe its more of a critique on the school, but no one tests you on your ability to disassemble an engine and rebuild it. They simply make you write a test based off terms you learned in a textbook.
This was exactly my experience in high school, university, and now the same in college.
I would of killed for this bot during my math courses in university.
JumpCrisscross · · focus · HN ↗
Out of curiosity, where–geographically–are you going to school?
If you're able to pass you theoretical tests without AI, it's fair to say you're learning what's being tested.
Ralo · · focus · HN ↗