Wrapping Up "Am I Literate" by Kate Arthur - S3E48 - What does it mean to lead schools in an era of AI

ABOUT THIS EPISODEWe have been circling this topic for a while. AI is everywhere in our schools right now, and the loudest conversations tend to be about policy and tools, about what students should or should not be allowed to do. But in this episode, Garth and Jason slow down and ask a different set of questions: What is this moment actually asking of us as leaders? What does it mean to be literate when a machine can write? And how do we build the kind of trust in our communities that makes navigating all of this possible?This is not a how-to episode. It is more of a thinking-together episode. And we think that is exactly what this moment calls for.WHAT WE GET INTO00:00 - Setting the table: why this conversation, why now05:55 - What does literacy actually mean when AI can tell your story for you?08:20 - Revisiting mission, vision, and values through an AI lens11:28 - Coherency and clarity: the leadership work only humans can do14:17 - Why imperfection might be the most important thing we can model right now16:22 - Finding the balance: technology in service of connection, not instead of it18:34 - Where we go from here, and what we are still figuring outA FEW LINES THAT STUCK WITH US"What does it mean to tell your own story?""Trust is becoming more important in our society, not less. And schools are one of the few places that can actually build it.""How are we going to build trust through imperfection? Because that might be the whole game right now."KEY TAKEAWAYSThe question of AI in schools is not primarily a technology question. It is a values question. When we sat with that, it shifted the whole conversation.Literacy has always been about more than decoding words. It is about authorship: the ability to find your voice, to make meaning, and to put something of yourself into the world. AI makes that question urgent in a new way. If a student can generate a polished essay in 30 seconds, what are we actually teaching them to do, and why?What we kept coming back to was trust. Not just the institutional kind, but the deeper kind: the trust a student has that their teachers see them, that imperfection is safe, that taking a risk will not cost them everything. Schools that can build that kind of trust will be the ones that find their footing in this moment. And the leaders who model curiosity over certainty will be the ones worth following.