What we've heard at winter conferences - Fine Point Communications

We’ve reached the midway point of the winter season of school conferences, with CASE-NAIS behind us and NAIS right around the corner. Presentations, keynote addresses and Q&As have encouraged new thinking and challenged conclusions within our industry.

Here are a few takeaways from sessions over the past month:

Still learning the AI basics …

Conferences are devoting plenty of time to generative artificial intelligence, given curiosity and interest in the technology. Three years into the AI era, sessions are more advanced — for example, how schools can build GPTs to produce bespoke outcomes.

Audience questions, though, still focus on foundational interests: whether Gemini, Claude or ChatGPT is the “right” tool to use, and whether a paid subscription to any system is really necessary.

The difference suggests a disconnect about whether educators are ready to step up the AI conversation.

… And going beyond the basics

Several speakers addressed issues around generative AI that, they believe, deserve awareness in schools:

Cheap subscriptions and the lock-in race: As businesses record billions in annual AI-related losses, they are running a familiar tech playbook: short-term pain to pursue long-term gain. They will tolerate red ink so long as their emerging technology builds market share. They also know that “lock-in” beckons, when customers who’ve invested gigabytes of data in a service become unwilling to move to another supplier. Lock-in will permit AI prices to rise from current, artificially low levels. Bottom line: Subscriptions won’t be $20 a month for long.

The impact of sycophancy: Chatbots are programmed to cater to emotions in a way that humanity doesn’t replicate. Why? To encourage a user to return to AI again and again, where ideas will be validated and complimented. Simply put, working with AI is easier than dealing with people. The technology will adjust human relations over time: Fine Point Off-Site keynote speaker Eli Saslow wrote about this last weekend for the New York Times. So today’s youngest users of AI will likely see the largest effect.

Outsourcing thinking: Reliance on machines helped move Western society from physical labor, like on a farm, toward sedentary labor, as in an office. In the process, bodies became less fit. Reliance on AI could drive a similar effect on mental strength. “Cognitive gyms” and other infrastructure that encourages the exercising of minds may become necessary in our communities.

Whose information is it anyway?

Last summer, we noted that photo-privacy issues are becoming a headache for schools. A significant percentage of parents are refusing to allow photographs of their children to be published, either online or in print.

Now this sentiment has a twist: School employees are starting to opt out, too. Some want their school picture to remain offline, others want not to be photographed while working, and a few have asked that personal information be removed from the school website.

All this prompts tough questions for educators surrounding digital privacy rights, the rise of tech-aided crime such as image scraping and social engineering, workplace equity and maintaining a friendly and approachable public image.

If your school hasn’t formed a task force on digital privacy, you’re overdue. Leaders need not only to understand the issues of concern but also to hear recommendations from campus experts on addressing them.

As always, communicators should engage with their shy or skeptical co-workers. Some of the objections may rest on headlines rather than personal experience, and a reasoned dialogue about authenticity and why it matters can influence attitudes.

Looking 10 years ahead

Author Jane McGonigal offered the following questions as a “foresight practice” to a ballroom of school heads and aspiring heads:

How similar or different do you expect your work will be in 10 years?
Are you excited or worried about the changes?
How much power do you have toward determining the path and velocity of change?

McGonigal urged her audience to aspire to increase the amount of power, even if only incrementally. Marginal but consistent growth would show great results over a decade, thanks to compounding.

Her model reminded us of a practice we shared in 2024: Considering how to achieve an outcome you don’t want often reveals the path to accomplishing what you do want.

And McGonigal’s first question could easily be reversed: Looking back 10 years, how much would you have expected your work to change, and what led to or prevented that actually happening? This examination would identify powerful factors in systemic change.

What’s new at Fine Point Communications

In one session, filmmaker Pete Davis extolled the value of community groups in improving civic health. Turns out, we have just such a gathering to propose: Next week, we will host the Fine Point Off-Site for communications directors in Seattle. If you’ve considered attending this exciting new event but haven’t yet signed up, this is your last chance.
On March 5, Scott Butterworth of Fine Point will co-present with Christina Hultholm of Grace Church School at the NYSAIS Advancement and Communications Conference in New Paltz, N.Y. Our topic will be “The Complete Communicator: Mastering the Skills That Matter Most.”
Finally, this issue of Refill begins our sixth year of monthly newsletters. Thank you for making a little time each month to enjoy the analysis we offer! We always love hearing how an issue landed with a reader and informed their planning and actions.