Lakeside School's AI Journey and Technology Leadership Lessons, with Jamie Britto
This episode features Jamie Britto from Lakeside School, discussing their proactive adoption of AI, including student-led initiatives and policy development. The conversation also explores the evolving landscape of cybersecurity and leadership strategies in independent school technology.
- Lakeside School
- Leadership and Technology at Independent Schools: A Handbook for School Leaders in Administration, Technology, and Academics, book by Albert Throckmorton, Jamie Britto, Tim Fish
- Partnerships in Technology and Learning, episode of Talking Technology with ATLIS featuring Tim Fish
- Source Code, Bill Gates memoir
- Helping Independent School Educators Use AI to Teach, episode of Talking Technology with ATLIS featuring Eric Hudson
Transcript
Peter Frank 00:00:02
Alex, welcome to Talking Technology with ATLIS,
Peter Frank 00:00:05
the show that plugs you into the important topics and trends for
Peter Frank 00:00:08
technology leaders all through a unique Independent School lens.
Peter Frank 00:00:12
We'll hear stories from technology directors and other
Peter Frank 00:00:15
special guests from the Independent School community,
Peter Frank 00:00:17
and provide you with focused learning and deep dive topics
Peter Frank 00:00:22
there is no need to adjust your internet. This is a talking
Peter Frank 00:00:26
technology with Atlas takeover. My name is Peter Frank. I am the
Peter Frank 00:00:30
Senior Director of certification and operations at ATLIS. And I
Peter Frank 00:00:36
am Bill
Bill Stites 00:00:36
Stites, the Director of Technology at
Bill Stites 00:00:39
Montclair Kimberly Academy in Montclair, New Jersey, and I'm
Bill Stites 00:00:42
scared for my life that Peter is in charge,
Hiram Cuevas 00:00:46
and I'm Hiram Cuevas, Director of Information
Hiram Cuevas 00:00:48
Systems and Academic Technology at St Christopher school in
Hiram Cuevas 00:00:51
Richmond, Virginia. And I am not fearful at all.
Unknown 00:00:55
You should be.
Peter Frank 00:00:56
Thank you, Hiram. Saying, Hiram has all the
Peter Frank 00:00:59
confidence. Kristina has all the confidence. We're doing
Peter Frank 00:01:02
something different today from the normal thing. Kristina,
Peter Frank 00:01:05
sorry she can't be here. She'll definitely be back for our avid
Peter Frank 00:01:08
listeners, but we're going to try something new, and that's
Peter Frank 00:01:11
fine. I've been behind the scenes, and now I get to flip
Peter Frank 00:01:13
the mic on for once, so we're going to have a good time here.
Peter Frank 00:01:16
We've got a fantastic guest. We're looking forward to that,
Peter Frank 00:01:19
and this all made me think about people relinquishing control. I
Peter Frank 00:01:24
think naturally, as humans, we have drivers and we have
Peter Frank 00:01:27
passengers where we're more comfortable. So I'm curious
Peter Frank 00:01:30
Hiram and Bill, where you both fall. I know that I was born a
Peter Frank 00:01:35
natural I'm more comfortable driving, but I was very
Peter Frank 00:01:39
fortunate when I was in my 20s, I had a couple mentors. I
Peter Frank 00:01:43
learned from them the value of being comfortable as the
Peter Frank 00:01:46
passenger, and that has served me well throughout my life. But
Peter Frank 00:01:50
I'm curious about you guys, are you more comfortable driving or
Peter Frank 00:01:53
more comfortable being the passenger, either figuratively
Peter Frank 00:01:56
or literally? Well,
Hiram Cuevas 00:01:59
I'll tell you, as a New York driver, I am always
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:01
likely to be the driver rather than the passenger, because I
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:05
just very little tolerance for poor driving. But
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:09
professionally, I would say it's an evolution. You know, you kind
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:12
of would like to be in charge, but sometimes you've got to
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:15
wait. You've got to prove yourself, and it's good to often
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:19
be the passenger, and then that grows. It's leading from behind.
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:23
And then eventually you can start doing some of that driving
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:26
on your own. But there's also nothing better than bringing
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:30
along new folks on the team that are passengers. And then all of
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:34
a sudden you can put it on cruise control, and all of a
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:37
sudden you realize that they are actually driving the ship and
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:40
doing a great job.
Bill Stites 00:02:41
I'm king of the road trip. Hiram knows this
Bill Stites 00:02:44
quite well. Is every summer we take our drive down to Florida
Bill Stites 00:02:47
to visit the mouse. We'll stop and see Hiram and I do that
Bill Stites 00:02:50
drive with my family, but I'm the only one that's driving
Bill Stites 00:02:53
because a I do enjoy the drive. I always like to keep moving. So
Bill Stites 00:02:58
I'll get off the road and try different things. If the path
Bill Stites 00:03:02
that was laid out isn't the path that's working or it's getting
Bill Stites 00:03:05
backed up, I'm willing to take detours. My wife is always the
Bill Stites 00:03:09
good navigator on the side. She's there helping out and
Bill Stites 00:03:11
trying to find different ways. And I think it's a great analogy
Bill Stites 00:03:14
for the work that we do in that I think for any of us that are
Bill Stites 00:03:18
in these types of positions, we've probably gotten here
Bill Stites 00:03:21
because there's been that desire to drive, but again, having the
Bill Stites 00:03:25
good navigator, having the person who can be by your side
Bill Stites 00:03:28
to help direct you along the way, is always helpful. And when
Bill Stites 00:03:31
you get tired, you need to be willing to pull over and let
Bill Stites 00:03:34
somebody else drive and know and trust in them that they can get
Bill Stites 00:03:38
you where you need to be. And I think while I may not do that a
Bill Stites 00:03:41
lot in my personal life, when on the road, I think we all need to
Bill Stites 00:03:45
put ourselves in positions where we can sit in that passenger
Bill Stites 00:03:49
seat and let somebody else drive, or particularly when we
Bill Stites 00:03:53
are engaged in new ideas or new ventures or in something that is
Bill Stites 00:03:58
going to require The work of a larger group, understanding
Bill Stites 00:04:02
where you are in that role and that you know you're going to
Bill Stites 00:04:05
get your time behind the wheel, but a lot of times, you're going
Bill Stites 00:04:07
to have to be in the van with everyone else and listening to
Bill Stites 00:04:10
the tunes and enjoying the ride as you go when you're not the
Bill Stites 00:04:14
one behind the wheel. So
Peter Frank 00:04:16
we have someone who's been driving for quite a
Peter Frank 00:04:18
while in this space. We are honored to have Jamie Britto
Peter Frank 00:04:23
from Lakeside school here. Jamie, welcome to the podcast.
Peter Frank 00:04:27
First of all, thanks for being here. Glad to be here. We
Peter Frank 00:04:30
appreciate it. And one thing that we'd like to do, we assume
Peter Frank 00:04:35
that you don't have a bachelor's, master's or
Peter Frank 00:04:37
doctorate in independent school technology leader, because most
Peter Frank 00:04:42
people don't, because that doesn't exist, usually. So we
Peter Frank 00:04:45
love to hear people's stories just briefly, about how you went
Peter Frank 00:04:49
from whatever you were doing before to you found yourself as
Peter Frank 00:04:53
a technology leader at independent schools. What's your
Peter Frank 00:04:56
story? Yeah,
Jamie Britto 00:04:57
and to look at the metaphor of dr. And traveling
Jamie Britto 00:05:01
that kind of connects, I think, with my origin story. Way back
Jamie Britto 00:05:04
in the day, I thought I was going to be a French teacher,
Jamie Britto 00:05:06
and my first job was teaching English in France. So the travel
Jamie Britto 00:05:11
metaphor is, I think figuring out how to get from point A to B
Jamie Britto 00:05:15
in Europe largely doesn't involve a car. So I like that
Jamie Britto 00:05:19
kind of navigation of the experience where you don't have
Jamie Britto 00:05:22
quite the same control of it's your car, and you go when you
Jamie Britto 00:05:25
want to go and you stop when you want to stop. But how do you
Jamie Britto 00:05:28
navigate the terrain and the options? Over my career, I've
Jamie Britto 00:05:32
taken a lot of trips internationally with students
Jamie Britto 00:05:35
from independent schools, and navigating those groups through
Jamie Britto 00:05:38
different cultures and transit schedules and missed flights and
Jamie Britto 00:05:41
those types of things has been its own adventure too. But I
Jamie Britto 00:05:45
think part of that control issue was so I thought I was going to
Jamie Britto 00:05:48
be a great French teacher. I taught in France for a year. I
Jamie Britto 00:05:50
collected all kinds of real Yeah, has, you know, it was
Jamie Britto 00:05:54
described at the time. I got back to Northern Virginia fair
Jamie Britto 00:05:58
Bucks County, and I applied for a French job, and the woman who
Jamie Britto 00:06:01
interviewed me was like, You have great skills. Happy to have
Jamie Britto 00:06:05
you get this job. But let me tell you, our projection is that
Jamie Britto 00:06:08
we have far more French teachers than we have need for French
Jamie Britto 00:06:11
teachers. So I recommend you not pursue this career and in the
Jamie Britto 00:06:18
way that things unfold and you figure something else out. They
Jamie Britto 00:06:21
did, however, have a high need for English as a second language
Jamie Britto 00:06:25
teachers, which I had just kind of done in France, and so I
Jamie Britto 00:06:28
began teaching ESL, you know, and has happens with new
Jamie Britto 00:06:32
teachers. Sometimes the department gave me the sections
Jamie Britto 00:06:36
that they didn't want to teach, which was largely, there was a
Jamie Britto 00:06:39
class of kids who arrived, had just arrived in the country, and
Jamie Britto 00:06:42
they spent two hours a day with me, you know, one point, 13
Jamie Britto 00:06:46
different languages, a range of different schooling backgrounds,
Jamie Britto 00:06:49
and so again, navigating that and responding to the classroom,
Jamie Britto 00:06:54
I think that has helped me be adaptive and kind of responsive
Jamie Britto 00:06:57
to the environment I'm in. The other thing that the teachers in
Jamie Britto 00:07:00
the teachers in the department didn't want to do is deal with
Jamie Britto 00:07:02
technology. So when they got a computer, they gave it to me and
Jamie Britto 00:07:05
said, like, figure this out. And I watched some students who, you
Jamie Britto 00:07:10
know, I had fairly small classes, but I watched some
Jamie Britto 00:07:12
students who were reluctant to talk to me or to the group, kind
Jamie Britto 00:07:16
of open up when they were doing some verbal processing. I was
Jamie Britto 00:07:18
writing some hyper card programs to use in my class, and I
Jamie Britto 00:07:23
watched some kids do better in that environment than with me or
Jamie Britto 00:07:27
with their classmates. And so I kind of saw that happen, and
Jamie Britto 00:07:31
that was a big moment. And then I kind of saw that so I was in
Jamie Britto 00:07:35
the beginning of that part and worked for Fairfax in the state
Jamie Britto 00:07:38
of Virginia, a bit on technology before a friend of mine had
Jamie Britto 00:07:42
moved to independent schools, Tim fish actually worked with me
Jamie Britto 00:07:45
in Fairfax County. We shared an office briefly, and he moved to
Jamie Britto 00:07:49
McDonough, and he was like, Hey, you have a young family. You're
Jamie Britto 00:07:52
in this situation. You should check this out. You should look
Jamie Britto 00:07:55
at independent schools. And then I moved over to Cape Fear
Jamie Britto 00:07:58
Academy in Wilmington, North Carolina as the tech director,
Jamie Britto 00:08:01
and that's kind of the story,
Peter Frank 00:08:04
nice. And there you go. And we've had Tim on this
Peter Frank 00:08:06
podcast before, so the small, independent school technology
Peter Frank 00:08:11
world here, right? Bill and Hiram that story, we've heard
Peter Frank 00:08:14
lots of people's origin stories that all sounds pretty familiar,
Peter Frank 00:08:18
I'm sure, to you guys. No,
Bill Stites 00:08:20
without a doubt, it's rarely the person in this
Bill Stites 00:08:22
position that went into independent schools thinking
Bill Stites 00:08:26
that this is what they were going to do, particularly in the
Bill Stites 00:08:29
age group for which we're talking here in particular. I
Bill Stites 00:08:32
think now you may see that a little bit more, but definitely
Bill Stites 00:08:35
in the early to mid 90s was definitely not one of those
Bill Stites 00:08:38
things.
Hiram Cuevas 00:08:39
And actually, Jamie and Tim, you guys did a
Hiram Cuevas 00:08:42
workshop in an AIS workshop after you published your book.
Hiram Cuevas 00:08:46
It was really the foundation for my career launching, because
Hiram Cuevas 00:08:50
your work actually predates my work here at St Christopher, so
Hiram Cuevas 00:08:55
I thank you for that, that first building block. Yeah,
Jamie Britto 00:08:59
that was a good time. It was a good
Jamie Britto 00:09:00
collaboration and figuring it all out. And again, you know, I
Jamie Britto 00:09:03
think part of that workshop you're remembering Hiram was
Jamie Britto 00:09:06
based around 12 questions. So again, posing questions rather
Jamie Britto 00:09:11
than providing answers, and seeing this community respond
Jamie Britto 00:09:15
based on where they're coming from and the different resources
Jamie Britto 00:09:18
and sizes of their schools. So I've enjoyed being part of all
Jamie Britto 00:09:21
of that. You've taken me down this car
Bill Stites 00:09:24
metaphor, Peter. So I've got all this stuff in my
Bill Stites 00:09:27
head, and it's interesting only in that both Hiram and Jamie are
Bill Stites 00:09:30
two people that when MKA was in the process of looking at
Bill Stites 00:09:36
different information systems, when we were thinking about
Bill Stites 00:09:38
making a pivot from where we were to where we are now, both
Bill Stites 00:09:42
Hiram and Jamie were two of the people in two of the schools
Bill Stites 00:09:45
that I actually went and did a site visit with to kind of see
Bill Stites 00:09:48
what was going on, to see their schools, not only to get a
Bill Stites 00:09:51
handle of what they're doing at the schools, but to understand
Bill Stites 00:09:53
how they were using their different information systems.
Bill Stites 00:09:56
If you want to talk about who's driving the car, who's in the
Bill Stites 00:09:58
passenger seat, you know it's. Like, who's driving me to the
Bill Stites 00:10:01
different dealerships, so I can look at the different cars and
Bill Stites 00:10:03
the different models and the ways in which they're doing
Bill Stites 00:10:06
things. And I think when it comes to leadership and things
Bill Stites 00:10:10
that each of us have done in this area, I think opening
Bill Stites 00:10:14
yourself up to have other people come in and see what you're
Bill Stites 00:10:18
doing and share directly with them is some of those things,
Bill Stites 00:10:22
Jamie, the book that you wrote, and Hiram, thanking you for
Bill Stites 00:10:25
that. I thank you and Hiram as well for opening yourselves up.
Bill Stites 00:10:29
Because I think without doing that, we as other school
Bill Stites 00:10:34
members, as other tech directors, we don't have the
Bill Stites 00:10:36
opportunity to learn and grow in the ways in which we might if we
Bill Stites 00:10:40
were never outside of our
Peter Frank 00:10:41
own building, certainly. I mean, one thing, as
Peter Frank 00:10:43
someone who's come from outside this community, one of the
Peter Frank 00:10:47
quickest observations I think I made watching y'all work
Peter Frank 00:10:49
together is how much sharing and how much people contribute for
Peter Frank 00:10:53
the common good and to keep moving things forward. That's
Peter Frank 00:10:55
definitely a factor that I see in this community. It's part of
Peter Frank 00:10:59
what makes the Atlas community and the community at large, so
Peter Frank 00:11:02
valuable and so special. I definitely see that, Jamie, you
Peter Frank 00:11:06
mentioned throwing someone at technology and saying, figure it
Peter Frank 00:11:09
out. And I understand that you've got some people that have
Peter Frank 00:11:12
been at your schools and that you've worked with some pretty
Peter Frank 00:11:14
high profile people that you might have some insight about.
Peter Frank 00:11:18
Can you talk a little bit about
Jamie Britto 00:11:19
that? Yeah, so I'm currently at Lakeside school,
Jamie Britto 00:11:22
and Lakeside was fortuitous in terms of all those things coming
Jamie Britto 00:11:25
together, that the parents association provided a computer
Jamie Britto 00:11:29
to the school, and Paul Allen and Bill Gates happened to have
Jamie Britto 00:11:33
been students at the school when they did that, and they
Jamie Britto 00:11:37
encouraged them to explore the computer. And so Bill has
Jamie Britto 00:11:41
recently released his first memoir. It's called source code,
Jamie Britto 00:11:45
and is speaking a lot about his time at Lakeside. I was here in
Jamie Britto 00:11:50
Seattle, I was at a different school, and I was here for the
Jamie Britto 00:11:53
NAIS conference, and I did the site visit to Lakeside, and they
Jamie Britto 00:11:56
have a little I call it the shrine, you know, where, like,
Jamie Britto 00:11:59
the computer that they used is in case, behind glass, and there
Jamie Britto 00:12:02
are photos of them and some statements, but one of the
Jamie Britto 00:12:05
things that was the prevailing vibe is the adults got out of
Jamie Britto 00:12:09
the way, and that took some trust, and that was in the 70s,
Jamie Britto 00:12:12
and that's obviously a different environment for independent
Jamie Britto 00:12:15
schools and whatnot, but the taking that risk and providing
Jamie Britto 00:12:18
the most recent, up to date tools to kids, and trusting them
Jamie Britto 00:12:24
to figure it out alongside us or in front of us is something that
Jamie Britto 00:12:28
I've you know, as well as being part of the community and
Jamie Britto 00:12:30
learning from others like Bill and Hiram, also learning from
Jamie Britto 00:12:34
kids very early on, my first job, Cape Fear Academy, I you
Jamie Britto 00:12:39
know, had hired a student or a student came to find Me, and was
Jamie Britto 00:12:41
helping me, like, move furniture around, and listening to him
Jamie Britto 00:12:44
talk about technology was as good as a graduate course. And
Jamie Britto 00:12:49
so I think that schools and independent schools are in a
Jamie Britto 00:12:51
better position, perhaps, than some public schools, to take
Jamie Britto 00:12:54
those chances and trust kids when it necessitates it or when
Jamie Britto 00:12:58
it's possible. And that was transformative for the school,
Jamie Britto 00:13:03
for the country, for the tech industry, and so I think we
Jamie Britto 00:13:07
honor and remember that, and are willing to lean into the messy
Jamie Britto 00:13:11
parts and the uncertain parts and not having control all the
Jamie Britto 00:13:16
time.
Hiram Cuevas 00:13:18
So Jamie, do you think that was the first
Hiram Cuevas 00:13:20
iteration of a disruptive moment in quote, unquote, Ed Tech.
Jamie Britto 00:13:25
It's interesting. Yeah, I don't know exactly all
Jamie Britto 00:13:28
that came before, but I watched this Netflix documentary a few
Jamie Britto 00:13:32
years ago called the brain of Bill Gates. And the couple of
Jamie Britto 00:13:35
the episodes go into detail as to what Paul Allen and Bill
Jamie Britto 00:13:38
Gates were doing with the computer. They were scheduling
Jamie Britto 00:13:41
the classes. They were figuring that out, and it was all, you
Jamie Britto 00:13:44
know, on a line. They had ran a telephone line from Lake sides
Jamie Britto 00:13:47
campus to the University of Washington, because it was
Jamie Britto 00:13:50
centralized computing. You know, it was punch cards that they
Jamie Britto 00:13:52
were using. But they figured out a billing system for the
Jamie Britto 00:13:58
Washington State utility company and were processing bills for
Jamie Britto 00:14:04
the state utility when they were in high school on this computer.
Jamie Britto 00:14:07
And so that kind of blows my mind. You know, in all of those
Jamie Britto 00:14:11
ways that they achieved such competency and understanding of
Jamie Britto 00:14:16
the technology that one, they were helping with the scheduling
Jamie Britto 00:14:19
of the school, but two, also branching out and doing these
Jamie Britto 00:14:23
projects. So I think so. And I think that you know the stories
Jamie Britto 00:14:27
of Paul Allen going to Harvard and talking to Bill about the
Jamie Britto 00:14:30
computer being released, and you know that they needed to go and
Jamie Britto 00:14:34
write the code like that. It encouraged them, I think, to
Jamie Britto 00:14:37
take those chances, big chances like drop out of Harvard and
Jamie Britto 00:14:41
start coding, and so I think that's disruptive. It certainly
Jamie Britto 00:14:45
was an early one and a big one, and particularly for schools to
Jamie Britto 00:14:48
do that. I've been in schools where to the driver analogy,
Jamie Britto 00:14:52
they would prefer to be in control. Much of the time you
Jamie Britto 00:14:55
know that the chance of someone throwing something wrong or
Jamie Britto 00:14:58
whatever, you know, like, how much. Free time do we give
Jamie Britto 00:15:01
students? How much exploration time do we give students? So I
Jamie Britto 00:15:04
think that was part of that different time and the different
Jamie Britto 00:15:06
culture that was helpful.
Bill Stites 00:15:09
Jamie, what does student involvement at Lakeside
Bill Stites 00:15:12
look like now, if they gave that to them at those early stages,
Bill Stites 00:15:16
now that you're there, what does that look like?
Jamie Britto 00:15:19
One of the things that I've taken with me at each
Jamie Britto 00:15:21
of the independent schools I've worked at, including that story
Jamie Britto 00:15:25
of the student who came in to help me move furniture. You
Jamie Britto 00:15:28
know, my first year is to hire students to help us with the
Jamie Britto 00:15:32
summer work, and it gives us a chance to connect. Gives us a
Jamie Britto 00:15:37
chance to help with some of the repetitive work that helps, I
Jamie Britto 00:15:41
think, independent school students, to get a an hourly job
Jamie Britto 00:15:45
that they show up and work at. And 80% of it is kind of the
Jamie Britto 00:15:49
grudge work of unpacking boxes or putting stickers on things
Jamie Britto 00:15:53
or, you know, hitting a certain sequence on key tabs and
Jamie Britto 00:15:56
cleaning projectors in classrooms and all of that. But
Jamie Britto 00:16:00
it facilitates, over time, relationships and encouraging
Jamie Britto 00:16:04
kids in technology. And so, you know, we've had a number of kids
Jamie Britto 00:16:08
come through that summer program. And right now, where
Jamie Britto 00:16:11
that's really exciting and manifesting itself is that a
Jamie Britto 00:16:14
group of students, the core who had done that summer work were
Jamie Britto 00:16:18
really interested last summer in AI, and they had been working in
Jamie Britto 00:16:22
kind of the 20% time, like 80% you're supposed to be on packing
Jamie Britto 00:16:25
boxes, and 20% we try to give you something a little more
Jamie Britto 00:16:28
interesting. In that 20% time, they started to build a computer
Jamie Britto 00:16:33
to host local models on, and they really kind of caught fire.
Jamie Britto 00:16:38
They collaborated with members of my team who had interest in
Jamie Britto 00:16:41
background and how to set up those types of computers. And by
Jamie Britto 00:16:45
August, we were four weeks into the project, we were ready to
Jamie Britto 00:16:49
share that with the administrative team, and their
Jamie Britto 00:16:51
pitch was to host what they call the Andromeda server on campus
Jamie Britto 00:16:56
and provide access to the local models and all of the different
Jamie Britto 00:17:01
models that they could possibly explore and load, as well as
Jamie Britto 00:17:05
some APIs into the paid versions, like Chat, GPT and
Jamie Britto 00:17:08
others. So it's kind of like a buffet of AI that you can go to
Jamie Britto 00:17:13
and to go through the process, not just of the technical piece.
Jamie Britto 00:17:16
I always like the phrase people process and technology. You
Jamie Britto 00:17:19
know, they figured out the technology pretty readily, but
Jamie Britto 00:17:22
then to figure out what was the process to be able to make that
Jamie Britto 00:17:26
sustainably available to other students, and how did they
Jamie Britto 00:17:29
navigate leadership and different questions and faculty
Jamie Britto 00:17:33
and all of that was great. And so to see those kids, they're
Jamie Britto 00:17:37
called the Andromeda captains. Now there's a club. Clubs are a
Jamie Britto 00:17:40
big part here. Two hours a week are given to clubs. They've
Jamie Britto 00:17:43
created a club where they have like 10 regular members come but
Jamie Britto 00:17:47
another 1530 come in, and they are building models and talking
Jamie Britto 00:17:51
about how they can be used in
Hiram Cuevas 00:17:52
classes. Jamie talk to us about those models.
Hiram Cuevas 00:17:55
What exactly are they developing and creating so that folks have
Hiram Cuevas 00:18:01
access to.
Jamie Britto 00:18:02
Yeah, so I think they began with the open source
Jamie Britto 00:18:05
model, so a lot of the meta llama stuff and working on, how
Jamie Britto 00:18:10
would they train those models for different things? But
Jamie Britto 00:18:13
they've expanded into just about everything. You know, we were
Jamie Britto 00:18:17
looking at this the other day, and I would say they have 20
Jamie Britto 00:18:19
different models available, which includes some of the API
Jamie Britto 00:18:24
connected models. And so in this instance, students are given an
Jamie Britto 00:18:29
account to the server, and they've also designed a way
Jamie Britto 00:18:32
where it tracks all of the conversations they've had. So
Jamie Britto 00:18:35
you know, if there's a question around the use, there's a log
Jamie Britto 00:18:39
file that shows exactly kind of what transpired on that server.
Jamie Britto 00:18:44
So,
Peter Frank 00:18:44
Jamie, it's fascinating. You were talking
Peter Frank 00:18:45
about in the past schools discovering technology and
Peter Frank 00:18:49
throwing it at the students and say, y'all figure it out. And
Peter Frank 00:18:52
fast forward to now, and it's a very different environment. The
Peter Frank 00:18:58
technology is different. The nature of the technology is
Peter Frank 00:19:00
different. The power that it possesses is different. So we
Peter Frank 00:19:03
understand, but we've had several guests come on. We
Peter Frank 00:19:07
always get around to talking about AI, and there are many
Peter Frank 00:19:09
different positions people have taken, and there's often just
Peter Frank 00:19:13
simply uncertainty, or, yeah, we're holding back, or we're
Peter Frank 00:19:16
restraining a bit, but your school has just gone all in with
Peter Frank 00:19:21
the AI. So I'm fascinated, you know, people worry about the
Peter Frank 00:19:25
challenges. I'm curious what challenges have already arisen,
Peter Frank 00:19:29
and how are you tackling that? How are you approaching those
Peter Frank 00:19:32
things?
Jamie Britto 00:19:33
Yeah, great question. You know, I think as
Jamie Britto 00:19:36
we look at the different aspects of our community, or components
Jamie Britto 00:19:39
of our community, we have faculty, we have students, we
Jamie Britto 00:19:42
have leadership, we have families. I think what surprises
Jamie Britto 00:19:47
me in AI perhaps more than in other places, and maybe it's not
Jamie Britto 00:19:50
a surprise given you know how big it is, but like the
Jamie Britto 00:19:52
emotional response that people have to it is greater than the
Jamie Britto 00:19:57
introduction of a smart board. Or the introduction of an LMS.
Jamie Britto 00:20:02
So there are a wide range of like, from very enthusiastic
Jamie Britto 00:20:06
people to people who feel like this could be the beginning of
Jamie Britto 00:20:09
the end of humanity. You know, that have concerns about
Jamie Britto 00:20:13
copyright and the impact on the environment and the impact on
Jamie Britto 00:20:17
other people of society. And like, you know, where is some of
Jamie Britto 00:20:20
that training happening in other parts of the world. And so we're
Jamie Britto 00:20:23
having all of those conversations. We're having the
Jamie Britto 00:20:27
difficult conversations about, what does it mean to teach and
Jamie Britto 00:20:29
learn and work in the world of rapidly changing AI and one of
Jamie Britto 00:20:34
my favorite moments the succinctness of students.
Jamie Britto 00:20:37
Sometimes there's another group that is called the AI advisory,
Jamie Britto 00:20:41
which is a less technical group, more interested in these
Jamie Britto 00:20:44
societal issues and advising the school on how they should
Jamie Britto 00:20:48
approach it. From a student perspective, a panel of five or
Jamie Britto 00:20:52
six students from the two groups came and sat before the Upper
Jamie Britto 00:20:55
School faculty and answered questions from the faculty and
Jamie Britto 00:20:59
Lakeside is really rooted in the Harkness table model and the
Jamie Britto 00:21:03
Socratic method, and so there's a very strong culture of
Jamie Britto 00:21:06
students and faculty engaging in that type of dialog. Teachers
Jamie Britto 00:21:11
kind of kept hitting on certain points about inappropriate use
Jamie Britto 00:21:15
of AI. And where is that line and the concerns? And I think I
Jamie Britto 00:21:19
inferred in that the concern about, well, I've learned how to
Jamie Britto 00:21:24
do this job really well. I have, you know, 2030, years of
Jamie Britto 00:21:28
experience doing this job, and this is upending that. And one
Jamie Britto 00:21:33
of the students after that, and some back and forth about, like,
Jamie Britto 00:21:36
you know, what's the difference between a Google search and an
Jamie Britto 00:21:38
AI search? And those types of discussions said, you know, at
Jamie Britto 00:21:40
the end of the day, I think you're just gonna have to change
Jamie Britto 00:21:43
your assessments. And I thought, like, yeah, that's a succinct
Jamie Britto 00:21:47
statement, and that is a challenge to us about if we're
Jamie Britto 00:21:51
doing that, then we're gonna need to change that. And then
Jamie Britto 00:21:53
the parent group we were talking about that, and a mom who was
Jamie Britto 00:21:57
working in one of the tech companies here in Seattle said,
Jamie Britto 00:22:00
Soon extrinsic knowledge will be at our fingertips. What we do
Jamie Britto 00:22:05
with the intrinsic knowledge? How we cultivate intrinsic
Jamie Britto 00:22:07
knowledge will be the challenge to schools. So how do you do
Jamie Britto 00:22:11
that? And I've been having that play over my head frequently,
Jamie Britto 00:22:15
because in my life, you had to get the extrinsic knowledge
Jamie Britto 00:22:20
first before you could then develop intrinsic knowledge. And
Jamie Britto 00:22:24
so, you know, it's a cognitive shift for me to think about how
Jamie Britto 00:22:27
you could begin building intrinsic knowledge without
Jamie Britto 00:22:30
having acquired the extrinsic knowledge. So I think those are,
Jamie Britto 00:22:33
you know, uncomfortable places to be there aren't ready
Jamie Britto 00:22:36
answers. You know, Eric Hudson is has a phrase something like
Jamie Britto 00:22:40
fluency with AI before policy. And so we have a very succinct
Jamie Britto 00:22:44
policy. It's two sentences, really, for kids. And I think,
Jamie Britto 00:22:49
you know, we need to keep getting fluent with it, and it
Jamie Britto 00:22:52
changes so quickly. That's another part that's different
Jamie Britto 00:22:55
than other kind of adoption pieces for us, that where we
Jamie Britto 00:22:58
were 18 months ago is not where we are now. So I think, you
Jamie Britto 00:23:02
know, being able to not be too attached to any particular
Jamie Britto 00:23:06
insight right now is important.
Bill Stites 00:23:09
One of the questions I have for you, and I
Bill Stites 00:23:11
was thinking about this because you mentioned fluency, and it's
Bill Stites 00:23:14
one of the things that I think we've been talking about are
Bill Stites 00:23:18
like all the different tools that are out there, and how do
Bill Stites 00:23:21
you use those tools, and which tools do you choose, so on and
Bill Stites 00:23:24
so forth. And I know that you've kind of gone all in on Chat GPT
Bill Stites 00:23:30
at the school, which gives you the one tool to focus on. How
Bill Stites 00:23:35
did you come around to that? What were the discussions like
Bill Stites 00:23:37
leading up to that? How have you launched that in the way that
Bill Stites 00:23:41
you've had to be able to provide that level of access to the
Bill Stites 00:23:44
community? Yeah,
Jamie Britto 00:23:45
great question. And again, what I appreciate
Jamie Britto 00:23:48
about the leadership of the school chi is chi by name, is
Jamie Britto 00:23:50
the head of school and the board and the general administrative
Jamie Britto 00:23:54
team is the idea that we're going to have to plan in much
Jamie Britto 00:23:57
shorter time frames. And so what drove our move to open AI and to
Jamie Britto 00:24:03
Chat GPT was probably three fold. One was that it was
Jamie Britto 00:24:08
considered kind of the Swiss Army knife, of all of these
Jamie Britto 00:24:11
tools. You know, that it was a well received model. It was
Jamie Britto 00:24:13
powerful. It did different things. It was evolving. And two
Jamie Britto 00:24:18
that we needed to have equitable access to the community. And so
Jamie Britto 00:24:24
we knew that some families and some students were having paid
Jamie Britto 00:24:27
versions and different versions, and some families were not
Jamie Britto 00:24:31
receptive to AI in general, or that they were just using the
Jamie Britto 00:24:34
free models. And so the step this summer was, or this spring,
Jamie Britto 00:24:38
rather, that I'm kind of calling the AI sprint, was to provide
Jamie Britto 00:24:42
access on an opt in basis to any faculty member five through 12
Jamie Britto 00:24:47
were middle and upper school, so any faculty member five through
Jamie Britto 00:24:50
12 and any upper school student whose parents opted them in and
Jamie Britto 00:24:56
so behind the scenes with that decision was. So we worked with
Jamie Britto 00:25:00
the school lawyers and with open AI about if we're going to be
Jamie Britto 00:25:04
providing accounts to students who are under 18 years old, you
Jamie Britto 00:25:08
know, kind of in the 13 to 17 year range. What did we need to
Jamie Britto 00:25:11
do? And so we crafted an opt in language that said we understand
Jamie Britto 00:25:17
that the school is providing this tool to our child and that
Jamie Britto 00:25:21
they do not have the ability to monitor or regulate its use. And
Jamie Britto 00:25:26
again, we offer that to teachers as well. And so the idea was to
Jamie Britto 00:25:29
kind of level the playing field, and say, for the fourth quarter,
Jamie Britto 00:25:33
and teachers have had it since February. But like, what do we
Jamie Britto 00:25:37
have to learn from having access to this model? And, you know, I
Jamie Britto 00:25:41
think AI is a bit of a horse race that people the pack shifts
Jamie Britto 00:25:45
around open. AI has certainly been in the top three most of
Jamie Britto 00:25:48
the time, but we're recognizing, you know, that we need to be
Jamie Britto 00:25:51
able to pivot to something else if need be. So this is a
Jamie Britto 00:25:55
commitment through the end of this school year. We're looking
Jamie Britto 00:25:57
at summer school as a second iteration, where courses may be
Jamie Britto 00:26:02
like more deliberately AI oriented, where that's a clearer
Jamie Britto 00:26:06
message. Summer School is a great environment, I think, to
Jamie Britto 00:26:09
do that, you know, because you're there kind of all day on
Jamie Britto 00:26:11
the topic. We will let that dust settle, we'll review what we've
Jamie Britto 00:26:13
learned, and we'll come back and see what we should do for the
Jamie Britto 00:26:17
fall. So a lot of quick changes around that too, and a certain
Jamie Britto 00:26:21
agility in the institution.
Hiram Cuevas 00:26:24
So Jamie, just curious, I imagine, with Bill
Hiram Cuevas 00:26:27
Gates as one of your famous people, you're probably wedded
Hiram Cuevas 00:26:30
to a lot of Microsoft products as well. Where did copilot stack
Hiram Cuevas 00:26:35
up? Yeah,
Jamie Britto 00:26:36
we have used a lot of Microsoft products
Jamie Britto 00:26:39
historically, copilot did not stack up very well. We were
Jamie Britto 00:26:45
excited by the possibilities, particularly our current focus
Jamie Britto 00:26:48
right now is on teaching and learning and less about
Jamie Britto 00:26:51
productivity. But at the time when copilot came out, you know
Jamie Britto 00:26:55
the idea that was going to help you handle your inbox better,
Jamie Britto 00:26:59
you know those were all important questions. And so we
Jamie Britto 00:27:02
looked at that, we got a few accounts, we sent someone to a
Jamie Britto 00:27:05
conference. And one of the things that the member of my
Jamie Britto 00:27:07
team that went to the conference came back with was like, like so
Jamie Britto 00:27:10
many things with Microsoft, you have to structure your data
Jamie Britto 00:27:14
ideally, specifically, you know, with SharePoint and OneDrive and
Jamie Britto 00:27:20
the different stores for it to work, and it required kind of a
Jamie Britto 00:27:24
monolithic commitment to these Microsoft products. But we use
Jamie Britto 00:27:28
Google Drive, you know, we have other places. It's not that kind
Jamie Britto 00:27:31
of one experience that way. And so we saw the cost of admission
Jamie Britto 00:27:37
was going to be so high on getting people to do that, and
Jamie Britto 00:27:40
the benefit uncertain that that fell out of contention early on
Jamie Britto 00:27:46
in the race. And I'll say like Microsoft is a big contributor
Jamie Britto 00:27:50
to open AI too, so I like to feel like we're honoring that
Jamie Britto 00:27:52
part of our legacy with open AI as well.
Hiram Cuevas 00:27:57
Sure. No, absolutely. Well, at least to
Hiram Cuevas 00:28:00
the question of, you know, are you looking at a data warehouse
Hiram Cuevas 00:28:02
versus a data lake in terms of the modeling that you're talking
Hiram Cuevas 00:28:05
about there as well? Yeah.
Jamie Britto 00:28:07
And I think again, like the gut experience that
Jamie Britto 00:28:10
people have Chat GPT is what's captured the imagination,
Jamie Britto 00:28:13
largely. And so we want to be current with those discussions
Jamie Britto 00:28:17
as well. Yeah,
Peter Frank 00:28:18
Jamie, I want to back up a little bit because you
Peter Frank 00:28:21
talked about the plan. So you've got the this semester plan, next
Peter Frank 00:28:24
semester plan, multi stages when you were developing all of this.
Peter Frank 00:28:29
I'm curious both how involved were students in developing the
Peter Frank 00:28:33
plan and what themes emerged as we're definitely going to have
Peter Frank 00:28:37
to deal with this, and we'll definitely have to deal with
Peter Frank 00:28:40
that. I'm curious about those things, you
Jamie Britto 00:28:42
know. I guess it's easier to look back than it
Jamie Britto 00:28:45
would be to have looked forward, you know, and kind of see, like,
Jamie Britto 00:28:48
what happened. I don't know that it was intentional all the time.
Jamie Britto 00:28:52
The way things unfold, it right? Like that metaphor of like, you
Jamie Britto 00:28:54
thought you're going to take the train, but you had to take a cab
Jamie Britto 00:28:57
instead. The student groups that I mentioned, the Andromeda club
Jamie Britto 00:29:02
that works on the hosted model, and the Advisory Council have
Jamie Britto 00:29:06
been part of the dialog for the last eight months, 10 months,
Jamie Britto 00:29:11
and so they've had that perspective, and they've been
Jamie Britto 00:29:13
advocating, you know, like this, again, this local model that is
Jamie Britto 00:29:16
available to everyone that has different access, So that,
Jamie Britto 00:29:19
again, as an equitable access. But on campus, we also began
Jamie Britto 00:29:24
conversations with the faculty about that and how they would
Jamie Britto 00:29:28
like to use it and support it. Then we, you know, we had micro
Jamie Britto 00:29:30
grants available for the last two years to faculty where they
Jamie Britto 00:29:34
pitched a particular instructional use or
Jamie Britto 00:29:37
productivity use for themselves, and they tried it. So we were
Jamie Britto 00:29:40
having that dialog of, what are we seeing with these tools, and
Jamie Britto 00:29:44
how does that inform policy? And I would say my inference is that
Jamie Britto 00:29:48
the head of school thought that we had reached a tipping point
Jamie Britto 00:29:51
and we were ready to take this chance that there were enough
Jamie Britto 00:29:54
people, there were enough early, promising developments. And
Jamie Britto 00:29:59
societally, i. You know, that's another piece that schools
Jamie Britto 00:30:01
think. One of my quotes, another quote I like, I think, was from
Jamie Britto 00:30:04
Will Richardson, and he said, schools measure time with a
Jamie Britto 00:30:09
calendar and technology with a stop watch. And so the idea that
Jamie Britto 00:30:13
schools can control that timing sometimes is delusional, perhaps
Jamie Britto 00:30:19
a bit. And so I think like seeing how the outside world was
Jamie Britto 00:30:23
responding, or how it was developing outside of school,
Jamie Britto 00:30:27
equally influenced us or encouraged us to step into that.
Jamie Britto 00:30:30
So head of school went to the upper school department heads
Jamie Britto 00:30:33
and had a conversation about it. They then had conversations
Jamie Britto 00:30:37
within their departments. We had some general meetings. We
Jamie Britto 00:30:39
informed the students who had been helping us with this, and
Jamie Britto 00:30:42
they started they started to help us craft this. And it was
Jamie Britto 00:30:45
also like, what can we try right now? You know, like, it was less
Jamie Britto 00:30:48
about the master plan, about, like, what can we provision? How
Jamie Britto 00:30:52
can we work it out? How can we get this experience this spring,
Jamie Britto 00:30:56
so that we have something to build on. So I like that design
Jamie Britto 00:30:59
thinking model of what can we try now, and I think that
Jamie Britto 00:31:02
probably drove a lot of it, rather than the perfect 18
Jamie Britto 00:31:07
months, three year plan. So
Bill Stites 00:31:09
Jamie, one of the questions that always pops up in
Bill Stites 00:31:12
terms of that fluency piece, you know, how do you develop that
Bill Stites 00:31:15
fluency? What is your professional development plan
Bill Stites 00:31:18
been like for working with faculty to help build that
Bill Stites 00:31:21
fluency. How does that shape up? What does that look like?
Jamie Britto 00:31:24
Well, since that email went out from the academic
Jamie Britto 00:31:27
dean two years ago, you know, we've been encouraging people so
Jamie Britto 00:31:31
we have made accounts available. We've been willing to work with
Jamie Britto 00:31:34
folks. We had a full day developed to AI for the faculty
Jamie Britto 00:31:38
two years ago, and I think some of the things that were
Jamie Britto 00:31:41
successful on that day was one, we created a couple of places we
Jamie Britto 00:31:45
called playgrounds, where we had all the different AI models
Jamie Britto 00:31:48
available for teachers to try and there were guides there to
Jamie Britto 00:31:51
help them, including some students. But the part that I've
Jamie Britto 00:31:55
always liked in this job is finding the teacher who has used
Jamie Britto 00:31:59
a technology or has a specific story, you know, like the
Jamie Britto 00:32:02
critical friends model of giving feedback to teachers, where
Jamie Britto 00:32:06
they're sharing their story and it's about teaching and learning
Jamie Britto 00:32:10
and they're talking to other teachers. So that PD day, we had
Jamie Britto 00:32:14
had, you know, probably 15 to 18 different sessions where
Jamie Britto 00:32:18
teachers were talking about how they had used AI in their
Jamie Britto 00:32:22
classroom with students or in a productivity model. And so I
Jamie Britto 00:32:26
think that was important, and making those connections and
Jamie Britto 00:32:30
then supporting people who might be interested in that. So, you
Jamie Britto 00:32:33
know, in math and computer science in particular, there's a
Jamie Britto 00:32:36
disposition to looking at this, and it certainly changed in some
Jamie Britto 00:32:39
pieces. So, you know, one of my favorite examples was a math
Jamie Britto 00:32:42
teacher who teaches a B calculus, which is kind of not
Jamie Britto 00:32:46
the most competitive math at Lakeside. And so he was saying,
Jamie Britto 00:32:49
for non math majors who have access to this tool, what is it
Jamie Britto 00:32:53
that I want them to know and be able to do when it comes to
Jamie Britto 00:32:57
calculus? So that's a fascinating thing that he has,
Jamie Britto 00:33:00
and kind of, again, gets to that you're gonna have to change your
Jamie Britto 00:33:03
assessment question or statement, like, if non math
Jamie Britto 00:33:07
majors are taking calculus, how can he structure a lesson where
Jamie Britto 00:33:12
it assumes that they have access to open AI? And so that's
Jamie Britto 00:33:16
fascinating to me, and that power of that narrative and his
Jamie Britto 00:33:19
exploration is there. So I think it's encouraging those flowers
Jamie Britto 00:33:22
to bloom, while also providing the right structures throughout
Jamie Britto 00:33:26
the year and through summer workshops and grants to people.
Hiram Cuevas 00:33:31
So, Jamie, you mentioned mathematics. I'm
Hiram Cuevas 00:33:33
curious how you all have made the pivot from a curricular
Hiram Cuevas 00:33:37
perspective in computer science. I mean, the whole coding
Hiram Cuevas 00:33:41
landscape has been turned over on its head in terms of what
Hiram Cuevas 00:33:45
students and just general users are capable of now creating as a
Hiram Cuevas 00:33:49
result. Yeah,
Jamie Britto 00:33:50
so the computer science department was early to
Jamie Britto 00:33:53
this party, and we were providing different accounts for
Jamie Britto 00:33:56
them to experiment with that and see how that would change how
Jamie Britto 00:33:58
they wrote code. And you know, that's been a quick change. We
Jamie Britto 00:34:01
have members in our community who are in that area, and
Jamie Britto 00:34:05
they've been sharing their perspectives with the school as
Jamie Britto 00:34:07
well. So I think accepting augmentation in computer science
Jamie Britto 00:34:12
classes with AI is just happened, period. And I think
Jamie Britto 00:34:18
GitHub is another place that they've used freely to kind of
Jamie Britto 00:34:21
look at those types of things. And so it's kind of, again,
Jamie Britto 00:34:24
providing the professional grade tools to kids about what that
Jamie Britto 00:34:27
is. And you know, some of the students who work for us are
Jamie Britto 00:34:29
interested in being programmers, and they're saying, kind of like
Jamie Britto 00:34:33
me and teaching French like, I don't know that they're going to
Jamie Britto 00:34:36
need as many programmers as they did when I was a sophomore in
Jamie Britto 00:34:40
high school, you know, and so that's kind of a rapid change.
Peter Frank 00:34:43
Is there anything else Jamie, that you want to
Peter Frank 00:34:46
talk about as far as your AI project before we move on to
Peter Frank 00:34:49
other things? There's so much we want to talk to you about.
Jamie Britto 00:34:51
I'm excited to hear from the community broadly.
Jamie Britto 00:34:55
I'm looking forward to sharing these types of updates from time
Jamie Britto 00:34:58
to time, be it through some website. And so like, the
Jamie Britto 00:35:01
questions that we should be thinking about, the questions
Jamie Britto 00:35:04
you might have, like, what would you like us to know at the
Jamie Britto 00:35:07
different times? Like, you know, what might be reasonable for us
Jamie Britto 00:35:10
to conclude or observe in the spring and in the summer and in
Jamie Britto 00:35:13
the fall? Love to hear your thoughts today and over time as
Jamie Britto 00:35:17
well. So
Bill Stites 00:35:19
Jamie, one of the things I want to do, actually,
Bill Stites 00:35:21
is pivot slightly, and I want to go into the way back machine,
Bill Stites 00:35:26
sure, because I think about where I heard of you, and what
Bill Stites 00:35:30
was the thing that introduced me to you had to do with cyber,
Bill Stites 00:35:34
cyber security, cyber risk. I'm curious on a number of levels,
Bill Stites 00:35:39
but my first question is, since that point in time, where do you
Bill Stites 00:35:45
see things right now, from an area of cyber risk, just cyber
Bill Stites 00:35:50
awareness, from where you were to where you are now? Because I
Bill Stites 00:35:54
think a lot of things have changed, and a lot of things
Bill Stites 00:35:56
have stayed the same. So I'm really curious as to your take
Bill Stites 00:35:58
on it.
Jamie Britto 00:35:59
I have two kind of milestones along the way that I
Jamie Britto 00:36:03
think about and the first one was the first cyber incident
Jamie Britto 00:36:06
that I experienced and survived. And, you know, wrote about an
Jamie Britto 00:36:10
NBOA, and kind of led to that chapter of my career where I was
Jamie Britto 00:36:14
helping the Independent School community think about that. But
Jamie Britto 00:36:18
in that call, you know, it was in 2014 or 15 and prominent
Jamie Britto 00:36:24
member of the leadership team's email had been compromised. You
Jamie Britto 00:36:28
know, this is before MFA was really a thing, and it just spun
Jamie Britto 00:36:33
out. And the web that came out of that was remarkable to me in
Jamie Britto 00:36:36
terms of the abilities and motivations of a criminal
Jamie Britto 00:36:40
element to exploit that data and that they were in our systems.
Jamie Britto 00:36:45
They weren't on our campus, but they were menacing, and they
Jamie Britto 00:36:47
were out to steal and do harm. And when that happened,
Jamie Britto 00:36:54
eventually, I got on the phone with a lawyer, and I got on the
Jamie Britto 00:36:58
phone with a cyber forensic investigator, and we started to
Jamie Britto 00:37:02
figure out what we needed to do when an incident happens. Now,
Jamie Britto 00:37:07
there's typically an equal number of lawyers involved in
Jamie Britto 00:37:10
the conversation as there are technologists. And so I think it
Jamie Britto 00:37:13
is largely shifted to be a risk management question as much as
Jamie Britto 00:37:18
it is a technology question. And so I think, you know, like, what
Jamie Britto 00:37:22
is reasonable to do? How do we demonstrate that that we've been
Jamie Britto 00:37:27
reasonable? My CFO barrage has used a metaphor of, like,
Jamie Britto 00:37:32
building codes for fire inspection have led to the kind
Jamie Britto 00:37:36
of systematic approach of, how do we handle safety in
Jamie Britto 00:37:39
buildings? And while, you know, we all have to do the fire drill
Jamie Britto 00:37:42
and we have to check these different things that they have
Jamie Britto 00:37:44
largely reduced loss of life and property to fires. So she uses
Jamie Britto 00:37:49
that as an analogy to say, this is kind of where we're headed
Jamie Britto 00:37:52
with cyber as well. And we're establishing a legal framework.
Jamie Britto 00:37:56
We're establishing the insurance framework that decides what's a
Jamie Britto 00:37:59
reasonable risk, and how do we mitigate that? So we're never
Jamie Britto 00:38:02
going to be 100% but are we reasonable, and are we managing
Jamie Britto 00:38:07
risk relative to our resources, relative to the way that we do
Jamie Britto 00:38:11
work, and relative to the time and energy we have to spend on
Jamie Britto 00:38:14
it, you know? And I think that's the constant, is that
Jamie Britto 00:38:17
independent schools, even well resourced schools, there are a
Jamie Britto 00:38:20
lot of things competing for our attention, and so like, how do
Jamie Britto 00:38:23
we figure out, what is that right, risk tolerance? And one
Jamie Britto 00:38:27
of the takeaways for me is like, have you gone through the annual
Jamie Britto 00:38:30
assessment with cyber insurance, and did you get insured? And
Jamie Britto 00:38:34
that is like, a base level risk management, like, whatever
Jamie Britto 00:38:38
they're saying. And you know, those questions have changed. If
Jamie Britto 00:38:40
you filled out those surveys, like year to year, they'll
Jamie Britto 00:38:43
change, and we don't. Again, we move with calendars. We don't
Jamie Britto 00:38:46
move with stop watches. So when those things are coming up, it
Jamie Britto 00:38:49
can be a challenge, but I think that is the litmus test for what
Jamie Britto 00:38:52
is appropriate risk management.
Bill Stites 00:38:55
You know, generally, when those policies
Bill Stites 00:38:57
come up, I just dealt with it, so I know exactly what you're
Bill Stites 00:39:00
talking about, but it's one of those things where, when you
Bill Stites 00:39:03
read through that, and strangely enough, this morning, I was
Bill Stites 00:39:06
having a conversation with our director of HR, and having to
Bill Stites 00:39:09
explain what's in those policies, I almost wish more
Bill Stites 00:39:13
people would at least read the questionnaire that you've got to
Bill Stites 00:39:17
figure out, because I don't think there's enough of an
Bill Stites 00:39:21
understanding throughout the school, in the different areas
Bill Stites 00:39:25
in the school, just to what degree we need to be prepared
Bill Stites 00:39:30
when it comes to risk, and how many different areas that plays
Bill Stites 00:39:34
out. And you know, why do we do fishing exercises? Why do we
Bill Stites 00:39:39
need certain checks and balances around anything that has to do
Bill Stites 00:39:43
with financial interactions, and just an email isn't going to
Bill Stites 00:39:47
survive, and all of those pieces, I think building a
Bill Stites 00:39:50
greater level of understanding around those things. And I think
Bill Stites 00:39:53
that's what committees do you have in the school on risk, and
Bill Stites 00:39:57
who's on those, and how do you share that? I think it's just.
Bill Stites 00:40:00
So something I know we need to explore a little bit more. And I
Bill Stites 00:40:03
wonder how many other schools are in that same situation.
Bill Stites 00:40:06
Yeah,
Jamie Britto 00:40:06
I could talk about that a little bit. You know.
Jamie Britto 00:40:09
Again, I would say the schools I've worked at have been very
Jamie Britto 00:40:11
different in terms of their risk profiles and their resources.
Jamie Britto 00:40:15
But one thing I've always thought was important was to
Jamie Britto 00:40:18
never let a crisis go to waste, and so when something happens to
Jamie Britto 00:40:23
be ready to engage the community around that, because there's a
Jamie Britto 00:40:28
receptiveness at those moments that will fade. The other is
Jamie Britto 00:40:33
what might be called the call to expertise, and they sometimes go
Jamie Britto 00:40:35
hand in hand. So we've had an incident. Now let's have someone
Jamie Britto 00:40:39
explain it to us, but I have worked a long time going back to
Jamie Britto 00:40:44
that first incident at collegiate with the group that's
Jamie Britto 00:40:47
now at ancora. And so having in my second year here, I think we
Jamie Britto 00:40:52
had a large engagement with them, and they came on campus
Jamie Britto 00:40:55
and they interviewed people. And so it became like, you know, I
Jamie Britto 00:40:59
wasn't the one having the discussion head to head. It was
Jamie Britto 00:41:03
this expert coming in and interviewing people about their
Jamie Britto 00:41:05
process and raising that awareness that then allowed us
Jamie Britto 00:41:08
to kind of move forward. And so, you know, we continue to go back
Jamie Britto 00:41:13
to that. But their expertise, their ability to talk about the
Jamie Britto 00:41:17
flows and to be responsive to the concerns that people had,
Jamie Britto 00:41:20
have helped change that culture so that it's a broader
Jamie Britto 00:41:23
discussion, like you're saying. And here, the cyber policy is
Jamie Britto 00:41:28
largely handled by the controller, who oversees risk in
Jamie Britto 00:41:33
general, and she and I work well together on those pieces, but it
Jamie Britto 00:41:37
is understood has another aspect of risk that the controller
Jamie Britto 00:41:41
manages and that we work on together.
Peter Frank 00:41:44
It's such an important thing I remember this
Peter Frank 00:41:47
is I'm about to start my fourth year at Atlas, but when I first
Peter Frank 00:41:50
started, AI was not nearly as significant a topic four to
Peter Frank 00:41:55
three plus years ago, and it was all about cyber security and
Peter Frank 00:41:59
data privacy. That was the big thing. You know, so much of our
Peter Frank 00:42:02
content was dedicated towards that. So I was learning, oh,
Peter Frank 00:42:04
cyber security is the big topic. AI has come along, man, I've
Peter Frank 00:42:09
seen how it's just so quickly, not brushed it aside, but almost
Peter Frank 00:42:13
buried. Cyber security, data privacy, like all those problems
Peter Frank 00:42:17
still exist. And on top of that, we've got the AI. I think about
Peter Frank 00:42:20
the people I've met that they're the only person at their school
Peter Frank 00:42:23
that has to contend with these things. I really liked your
Peter Frank 00:42:25
example of things like using cyber insurance application and
Peter Frank 00:42:29
and your cyber insurance policy as a baseline ways, and you can
Peter Frank 00:42:32
help mitigate that. Could AI itself help with that issue of,
Peter Frank 00:42:37
what about cyber security? What about data privacy? Those are
Peter Frank 00:42:40
still concerns. Plus, we've got AI to deal with now, perhaps AI
Peter Frank 00:42:43
as much of the problem of overshadowing these other
Peter Frank 00:42:46
things, perhaps AI can actually help with some of those things.
Jamie Britto 00:42:50
Yeah, I can give you a couple examples where
Jamie Britto 00:42:52
that's been the case, and I would also add, so we're insured
Jamie Britto 00:42:55
through Beasley, which I think is a great insurance company to
Jamie Britto 00:42:58
be with. I've been with them at different times. I appreciate
Jamie Britto 00:43:00
the resources and responsiveness they have, but one of their
Jamie Britto 00:43:03
webinars maybe a year ago was on how AI is going to also just
Jamie Britto 00:43:09
increase the skill and threat of cyber attacks that the same
Jamie Britto 00:43:14
things that we can do in schools, the criminals are doing
Jamie Britto 00:43:17
now. They're able to write more compelling phishing emails.
Jamie Britto 00:43:21
They're able to provide background dossiers on public
Jamie Britto 00:43:24
figures. They are accelerating this in a big way, and the
Jamie Britto 00:43:29
ability to automate things is going to also come from Ai. One
Jamie Britto 00:43:33
of the things that we've done with the risk mitigation
Jamie Britto 00:43:37
profile, and that it is an ongoing process, the floor is we
Jamie Britto 00:43:42
get cyber insurance every year, whatever it takes to get that.
Jamie Britto 00:43:46
The ceiling is finding some other framework. And we're using
Jamie Britto 00:43:50
the CIS 18, where it allows us to kind of have a reporting
Jamie Britto 00:43:54
structure, to board into governance and to show where we
Jamie Britto 00:43:57
are. And it's, you know, 18 different categories. You get a
Jamie Britto 00:44:01
green, a yellow or a red, you know, we ended up with like, six
Jamie Britto 00:44:04
reds on our initial scan. So teachers don't like that.
Jamie Britto 00:44:08
Schools don't like red. So, like, we had to think about,
Jamie Britto 00:44:11
like, how are we going to move, you know? And one of my phrases
Jamie Britto 00:44:14
that I took from the Cubs that won the World Series, their
Jamie Britto 00:44:17
mantra that summer was, suck less. So, like, we're not going
Jamie Britto 00:44:20
to be great, but if you can suck less, maybe you win the World
Jamie Britto 00:44:24
Series. So it's about being better at second base with
Jamie Britto 00:44:28
whatever they were doing, the tags or whatever. And so when I
Jamie Britto 00:44:31
look at those CIS 18 and I'm thinking, like, yeah, we're not
Jamie Britto 00:44:34
going to be great. We don't need to be great, but we can suck
Bill Stites 00:44:37
less. That's what I say to hire them all the time.
Unknown 00:44:43
Brutal, man, I was gonna say the Phillies, but you
Unknown 00:44:45
know,
Jamie Britto 00:44:47
there we go. So one of the things where AI has
Jamie Britto 00:44:52
helped me specifically is CI s 18 and these different red
Jamie Britto 00:44:56
zones, or red area scores, you needed to write policy. These,
Jamie Britto 00:45:00
you needed to have policy to check the box or to get that
Jamie Britto 00:45:04
score, and you need to be able to write policies that you're
Jamie Britto 00:45:08
following. And so to have an AI assistant help me and say, you
Jamie Britto 00:45:13
know, this is the standard. This is what I'm doing. Help me craft
Jamie Britto 00:45:17
a policy and then be able to kind of revise it and revise and
Jamie Britto 00:45:20
revise it without it taking my mental power or knowledge to do
Jamie Britto 00:45:24
that and get to a policy that I can then bring to the people
Jamie Britto 00:45:28
that it's going to impact, or to, you know, and core, or to
Jamie Britto 00:45:31
the cyber insurance people. That has been a big catalyst for me.
Jamie Britto 00:45:35
I like this analogy of like, you have to know enough about the
Jamie Britto 00:45:38
problem at the beginning, and you have to know what good is at
Jamie Britto 00:45:40
the end, but AI can help you get from like step three to step
Jamie Britto 00:45:46
eight or nine much more efficiently. And I find that
Jamie Britto 00:45:50
there are certain times where I'm cognitively sharper during
Jamie Britto 00:45:53
the day, like I can do that type of synthesis. I can manage AI at
Jamie Britto 00:45:58
my lower cognitive levels, because I'm talking with it, and
Jamie Britto 00:46:03
it's helping me too. So I think that's a big one for me, is when
Jamie Britto 00:46:06
we look at this broader piece, how can it help us develop those
Jamie Britto 00:46:10
policies? That's fantastic.
Peter Frank 00:46:12
I think that's really helpful to people,
Peter Frank 00:46:14
especially those one person shops where they're the only
Peter Frank 00:46:17
person they have I'm definitely aware of when I am sharp is
Peter Frank 00:46:20
which is definitely early in the morning, and in the morning,
Peter Frank 00:46:23
I've not thought about AI filling in. From that
Peter Frank 00:46:26
perspective, that's really great. That's
Unknown 00:46:29
why Bill's on AI all the time.
Bill Stites 00:46:32
He had to get that in. He needed something there.
Bill Stites 00:46:34
He needed to come back at me with something Well played,
Peter Frank 00:46:37
Hiram. We'll put one on the board for Hiram,
Unknown 00:46:40
just trying to suck less
Peter Frank 00:46:45
well. Jamie, this conversation has been fantastic.
Peter Frank 00:46:48
We can kind of bring it home with being the driver, being the
Peter Frank 00:46:51
passenger. You're reaching the later stages of your career. So
Peter Frank 00:46:56
thinking about continuity, allowing someone else to drive,
Peter Frank 00:47:00
I'm sure is on your mind, so curious how you're managing the
Peter Frank 00:47:04
continuity for whomever is going to step into your shoes next,
Peter Frank 00:47:08
and those kinds of things could share with us.
Jamie Britto 00:47:10
Well, you know, one of the things I say again
Jamie Britto 00:47:12
and again and again is it's people, process and technology.
Jamie Britto 00:47:15
Also a significant focus for me has been being able to be
Jamie Britto 00:47:20
aligned with and talk to leadership. That was an up for
Jamie Britto 00:47:22
school head for a while, and I think that was a helpful
Jamie Britto 00:47:24
experience for me to understand the broader perspective. And so
Jamie Britto 00:47:29
where will the school need to be, where the schools
Jamie Britto 00:47:32
intentions, and what are the processes that we can put in
Jamie Britto 00:47:36
place now to kind of make sure things are stable. I believe
Jamie Britto 00:47:39
that your service desk, your ability to help people, your
Jamie Britto 00:47:42
ability to be seen as productive, is the number one
Jamie Britto 00:47:45
job a tech department has, and once you have that platform, you
Jamie Britto 00:47:49
can start to build into some of the other pieces. So I think I'm
Jamie Britto 00:47:53
not quite ready to sign those papers yet, but as I think
Jamie Britto 00:47:56
through those things like, am I developing members of my team,
Jamie Britto 00:48:01
and giving them the opportunity to take over pieces of
Jamie Britto 00:48:04
responsibilities, you know, where they're leading and I'm
Jamie Britto 00:48:07
consulting, is an important part that making things transparent,
Jamie Britto 00:48:12
figuring out a good process around just the stuff that has
Jamie Britto 00:48:16
to happen with technology, you know, and getting that built.
Jamie Britto 00:48:18
And so like at a previous school that I left to take a job here,
Jamie Britto 00:48:23
figuring out what the renewal process was going to be to
Jamie Britto 00:48:27
maintain equipment and the budgeting for that, and making
Jamie Britto 00:48:30
that transparent and getting agreement on all of that, that
Jamie Britto 00:48:33
was a key part of a leadership transition, because, again, to
Jamie Britto 00:48:38
have that sustainable base, It was important to have that thing
Jamie Britto 00:48:42
taken care of. You know, you have to build foundationally.
Jamie Britto 00:48:44
And then I think it's kind of the discussions, the candid
Jamie Britto 00:48:48
discussions with leadership, about, where are we not
Jamie Britto 00:48:51
performing as high as we might, where the opportunities an
Jamie Britto 00:48:54
exercise that I've done frequently, geez, I guess it's
Jamie Britto 00:48:57
coming up on 10 years now, like, in terms of, like, how things go
Jamie Britto 00:49:01
is to develop a series of questions that we pose to the
Jamie Britto 00:49:05
leadership of the school. So at Lakeside, that's about 18 folks
Jamie Britto 00:49:09
that are on the directors group, and it's 10 areas of technology
Jamie Britto 00:49:14
with the one sentence description that asks them, what
Jamie Britto 00:49:18
is your priority for these 10 things, and what is your
Jamie Britto 00:49:21
satisfaction with these things? We do the same thing with the
Jamie Britto 00:49:25
tech department, and we see where the alignment is. And
Jamie Britto 00:49:29
again, that's a leadership transition piece. That's a
Jamie Britto 00:49:32
leadership piece in general, but that exercise has been very
Jamie Britto 00:49:37
helpful to helping both sides understand it. And you know,
Jamie Britto 00:49:40
sometimes the director will say, Well, I don't know what this is.
Jamie Britto 00:49:43
I can't do this exercise. And so I work with them to say, well, I
Jamie Britto 00:49:46
this is basically what that is like. I need you to answer each
Jamie Britto 00:49:49
of these things. It's 10 things. So you have to have that base
Jamie Britto 00:49:53
knowledge to be able to rank them and give me your
Jamie Britto 00:49:56
satisfaction. But I think when you have that culture. Or an
Jamie Britto 00:50:00
experience, then it allows it to be more of an external map, like
Jamie Britto 00:50:06
we have a score card, and did we do those things? One of my
Jamie Britto 00:50:10
favorite pieces every time I've done that survey, Wi Fi is the
Jamie Britto 00:50:13
most important priority for everybody. And for three years,
Jamie Britto 00:50:17
I was like, You got to be kidding me. You know, there are
Jamie Britto 00:50:20
so many other things and like, look, this is a big campus.
Jamie Britto 00:50:24
You're going to switch buildings. It's not going to be
Jamie Britto 00:50:26
like your home, you know, it's not going to be the same. So I
Jamie Britto 00:50:29
was trying to persuade people that Wi Fi shouldn't be their
Jamie Britto 00:50:31
top priority. And eventually I came around to the fact that,
Jamie Britto 00:50:35
well, it was their priority. And I needed to figure that out. I
Jamie Britto 00:50:38
needed to address it. I needed to make it suck less, and I
Jamie Britto 00:50:41
needed to kind of see where we are, and like when you return
Jamie Britto 00:50:44
that you find the areas that are annoying, that's a high
Jamie Britto 00:50:48
annoyance level, and you work on them that helps build that
Jamie Britto 00:50:51
culture and helps with that transition too. So hopefully,
Jamie Britto 00:50:55
when it's time for me to change schools, or when it's time for
Jamie Britto 00:50:57
me to move into a different role, in general, the muscles
Jamie Britto 00:51:01
will be built up, the processes will be built up, the people
Jamie Britto 00:51:04
internally will be built up, and that collaboration and
Jamie Britto 00:51:07
communication with leadership will be there. And so whenever
Jamie Britto 00:51:11
there's a role change, be it at the head of the department or
Jamie Britto 00:51:13
within the department, hopefully that makes it more seamless and
Jamie Britto 00:51:16
less kind of of the tussle that sometimes has happened in my
Jamie Britto 00:51:20
career between a certain priority, or, you know, this or
Jamie Britto 00:51:22
that or the other thing,
Peter Frank 00:51:24
fantastic. You've piqued some interest. I think
Peter Frank 00:51:26
with the 10 question survey in that process, perhaps we can get
Peter Frank 00:51:30
our hands on a sample of those documents. I think a lot of
Peter Frank 00:51:33
people would be interested in that. Yeah, sure. Jamie, thank
Peter Frank 00:51:37
you so much for sharing your time and your insights with us.
Peter Frank 00:51:40
This has been a fantastic conversation. Thank you for
Peter Frank 00:51:43
putting up with Bill and Hiram. We really appreciate that. I
Peter Frank 00:51:46
just had to get that in there point for me. But in all
Peter Frank 00:51:50
seriousness, thank you so much for doing this for us. Our
Peter Frank 00:51:52
audience really appreciates it all the sharing that you're
Peter Frank 00:51:55
doing here. Thank you. You're welcome
Unknown 00:51:56
and thanks for having me.
Peter Frank 00:51:59
This has been talking technology with Atlas,
Peter Frank 00:52:02
produced by the Association of Technology Leaders in
Peter Frank 00:52:05
Independent Schools. For more information about Atlas and
Peter Frank 00:52:08
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Peter Frank 00:52:12
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Peter Frank 00:52:16
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Peter Frank 00:52:18
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