On Wednesday, Sept. 23, the 3-D Art and Design Club hosted an interview with Sal Khan, the founder of Khan Academy, a free American educational nonprofit organization with more than 189.6 million registered users.
Khan began by sharing with Poly students and faculty his childhood experience in New Orleans and how he initially developed an interest in education. Growing up, he participated in math and physics competitions and joined his high school’s peer tutoring program. This experience revealed his passion for tutoring. However, even after graduating and enrolling at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Khan remained uncertain about his professional future.
After earning his undergraduate degree in computer science, he worked in the technology field before joining a hedge fund. There, one of Khan’s cousins asked if he could tutor them. Khan started posting videos online for his cousin, but many others from around the country found his lessons helpful. Later, Khan left his job at the hedge fund to pursue this hobby full-time and created what we now know as Khan Academy.
In addition to discussing his background, Khan also explained that AI in education is like fire: it can help if it is used right, and it can hurt us if used wrong. Khan believes that there is a huge opportunity to utilize AI in education as long as people use it properly.
“Sometimes you can only learn as fast as you can get feedback on it,” Khan advised. “The important skill is that you know how to learn things fairly quickly especially because AI is going to constantly change.”
Senior Arjun Dhadwal, the leader of the 3-D Art and Design Club, said, “He really focused on the idea of using AI positively as a tool. In fact, he used the example of how he asked AI to summarize the conflicts that were happening in the Middle East and that really showed how AI can be beneficial.”
Another attendee, freshman Ethan Wu, said, “Mr. Khan taught me how to use AI in a better way than what I am currently doing now.”
Upper School Mathematics and Computer Science Teacher Dominic Rosato, who helped organize the event, noted, “My biggest takeaway was that Mr. Khan seemed really thoughtful about how learning can be enhanced by AI use rather than trying to avoid it. He seemed acutely aware of the challenges of this potentially new frontier in learning, but he also seemed quite excited about the opportunity.”
