Submission + - IN Secretary of Education Joins Board of Tech-Backed AI/CS Curriculum Provider
theodp writes: Amid pushback against K-12 AI — including AI moratoriums in the nation's largest school districts (NYC and LA) — tech-backed nonprofit CodeAI issued a press release Friday announcing that Katie Jenner, Indiana Secretary of Education, Joins CodeAI Board of Directors ("The state chief behind one of the country's most ambitious efforts to make AI education foundational brings state-level policy leadership to CodeAI's next chapter.").
From the press release: "Today, CodeAI [known as Code.org before an AI pivot] is proud to welcome one of the country's most effective architects of building the foundations for AI education: Katie Jenner, Indiana Secretary of Education, has joined CodeAI's Board of Directors. AI is already reshaping how students learn, work, and make decisions — often faster than schools can respond. Preparing young people for that world takes more than access to new tools. It takes leaders who can build the policy foundations that let an entire state move. Dr. Jenner's appointment reflects CodeAI's future. As a state chief, she hasn't just advocated for change — she has built the conditions for it, setting the standards, requirements, and accountability that give educators across Indiana the ability to make the AI education foundational for their students. She’s cleared the policy barriers so that teachers throughout the state can build the classrooms students need, and so that every student can develop the digital fluency to understand, direct, question, and create with the technology shaping their lives. [...] Her perspective will help guide CodeAI as the organization scales its work nationally — ensuring that understanding the technology shaping our world doesn't become a privilege of zip code, but a foundation available to every student."
In 2024, Indiana became the 9th state to make CS a high school graduation requirement after Jenner and Code.org rallied support for the legislation. Helping in that effort was Nextech, an Indiana nonprofit that launched in 2015 as an early Code.org regional partner with a "mission to help cultivate tech talent in Indiana by focusing on K-12 students," including introducing Code.org's curriculum into Indiana's classrooms. Following passage of the legislation, Code.org produced a new Indiana-specific Computing Foundations for a Digital Age: Indiana (AI Foundations) course, a pared-down semester-long version of its year-long curriculum that enables Indiana middle and high school kids to fulfill their CS graduation requirement. Nextech and Code.org offer support for the course, and stipends and travel reimbursement are available for teachers who attend in-person professional development for the course. With Jenner's support, Indiana schools were also early adopters of the Khanmigo AI chatbot tutor, participating in a widely-publicized pilot with CodeAI partners Khan Academy and OpenAI.
So, is Indiana's Secretary of Education joining tech-backed CodeAI's Board cause for celebration, or does it raise concerns about the kind of 'corporate capture' of K-12 classrooms explored in Coding Kids: Big Tech's Battle to Remake Public Schools?
From the press release: "Today, CodeAI [known as Code.org before an AI pivot] is proud to welcome one of the country's most effective architects of building the foundations for AI education: Katie Jenner, Indiana Secretary of Education, has joined CodeAI's Board of Directors. AI is already reshaping how students learn, work, and make decisions — often faster than schools can respond. Preparing young people for that world takes more than access to new tools. It takes leaders who can build the policy foundations that let an entire state move. Dr. Jenner's appointment reflects CodeAI's future. As a state chief, she hasn't just advocated for change — she has built the conditions for it, setting the standards, requirements, and accountability that give educators across Indiana the ability to make the AI education foundational for their students. She’s cleared the policy barriers so that teachers throughout the state can build the classrooms students need, and so that every student can develop the digital fluency to understand, direct, question, and create with the technology shaping their lives. [...] Her perspective will help guide CodeAI as the organization scales its work nationally — ensuring that understanding the technology shaping our world doesn't become a privilege of zip code, but a foundation available to every student."
In 2024, Indiana became the 9th state to make CS a high school graduation requirement after Jenner and Code.org rallied support for the legislation. Helping in that effort was Nextech, an Indiana nonprofit that launched in 2015 as an early Code.org regional partner with a "mission to help cultivate tech talent in Indiana by focusing on K-12 students," including introducing Code.org's curriculum into Indiana's classrooms. Following passage of the legislation, Code.org produced a new Indiana-specific Computing Foundations for a Digital Age: Indiana (AI Foundations) course, a pared-down semester-long version of its year-long curriculum that enables Indiana middle and high school kids to fulfill their CS graduation requirement. Nextech and Code.org offer support for the course, and stipends and travel reimbursement are available for teachers who attend in-person professional development for the course. With Jenner's support, Indiana schools were also early adopters of the Khanmigo AI chatbot tutor, participating in a widely-publicized pilot with CodeAI partners Khan Academy and OpenAI.
So, is Indiana's Secretary of Education joining tech-backed CodeAI's Board cause for celebration, or does it raise concerns about the kind of 'corporate capture' of K-12 classrooms explored in Coding Kids: Big Tech's Battle to Remake Public Schools?
