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Back-to-school season is here, and with it, comes a decision that will define the next decade for K-12 education. Do district leaders adopt curriculum-connected AI that builds on progress toward high-quality, standards-aligned instructional materials? Or do they rely on a mix of standalone tools that risk undermining that progress? This might seem like a technology choice. But in schools, curriculum isnt just a set of books or lesson plans. Its the roadmap that makes sure every child in every classroom is taught to the same high standards. States and districts have spent a decade working toward this reality by strengthening instructional coherence: When each lesson connects those high standards, students are building knowledge in a logical sequence rather than starting from scratch. Now, AI stands to either strengthen those hard-won gainsor unravel them. Thats why this moment is so consequential. Choosing which path to follow is a strategic decision that will shape coherence, teacher capacity, and student outcomes for years to come. The right move could turn AI into a powerful, trusted classroom ally. The wrong one risks fragmenting learning by generating random, disconnected activities with no link to what students or teachers actually need. As the CEO of an education technology company, I have a stake in these choices. And as a parent, I understand the impact it will have on families and students alike. What I see most is the potential for AI to serve as an assistant that can give teachers newfound insights on their students learning progressand then help create activities, materials, and communications aligned to those needs. In the process, it can give teachers hours back in their day that they can spend deepening their relationship with students. But only a few systems can connect all these pieces; plenty of others can devise a lesson, but do so in a vacuum. The real choice for district leaders today isnt AI or no AI. Its whether to invest in a coherent AI strategy that puts student learning first or in patchwork apps that meet short-term needs. The patchwork trap From the outside, giving teachers a menu of standalone tools might look like flexibility. In reality, it comes with steep hidden costs paid in time, trust, and potentially in student achievement. Weve seen this before. During the remote-learning era, when schools were flooded with apps, coherence sufferedand students paid the price. Teachers were overwhelmed with training on new systems. Student data got trapped in silos. IT teams (often composed of teachers working double duty) juggled duplicate contracts, inconsistent privacy standards, and rising security risks. While todays learning environment may look different, similar problems still persist. Many AI tools are pumping out generic worksheets or lessons with no connection to a districts curriculum. Others continue to raise red flags on privacy, asking teachers to paste in sensitive student work or data without clear protections. In both cases, the results are the same: The tools lack context, undermine coherence, and create more problems than they solve. The case for curriculum-connected AI There is another way, one that treats AI not as a grab bag of tools, but as a strategic layer within a coherent instructional system. Curriculum-connected AI flips the script on patchwork selection. It doesnt just generate content; it aligns instruction with what teachers are already teaching. It personalizes next steps by drawing on real-time student insights. And it keeps students’ data secure within education-specific boundaries. Its not just responsive, its relevant. And that approach is what builds teacher trust, not burnout. Ask any new teacher what it feels like to sift through hundreds of student responses on a test, and theyll tell you its overwhelming at best. Spotting patterns in all that data in real time is nearly impossible for just one person. Curriculum-connected AI can change that. By analyzing students work, AI can instantly highlight which skills most students have mastered, where a few need extra support, and what lesson comes next in the curriculum. That gives teachers the time back and the insight they need to personalize instruction without losing the curriculums throughline. The future belongs to districts that think like systems leaders. Districts that embrace an integrated approach are making a bet not just on technology, but on quality, coherence, and scale. Theyre recognizing that the future of AI in education isnt about how many tools you have; its about how well they work together to serve the teacher-student relationship. Curriculum-connected AI scales what works: quality instruction, real-time insight, and a secure, sustainable AI strategy. This fall, district leaders will face countless decisions. This is a pivotal one. The path they choose will determine whether theyre building for short-term convenience or long-term impact. Jack Lynch is CEO of HMH.
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E-Commerce
In 2017, Apples then-newest iPhone foreshadowed the most significant design shift in the devices history. With the iPhone Xs debut, Apples smartphone ditched its iconic home button so it could transition to an all-screen form factora design that was ultimately destined for every iPhone model. That transition was finally completed in 2025 when Apple scuttled the last iPhone with a home button, the iPhone SE, and replaced it with the all-screen iPhone 16e, finally bringing all-screen uniformity across the entire iPhone lineup that the iPhone X ushered in eight years earlier. When I look at Apples newly unveiled iPhone Air, I cant help but think it signals the beginning of the end for the single-screen iPhone. The Airs thinness is impressive, but the real story is what it foreshadows: a future where every iPhone comes with at least two screens. The iPhone Air feels like half a phone The iPhone Air Apple introduced today makes me feel like Im looking at just half of an iPhone. Thats a compliment. At just 5.6 millimeters thick at its thinnest point, the iPhone Air is the slimmest iPhone Apple has ever made. Its an engineering marvelno doubt about that. That Apple could fit storage, RAM, circuit boards, and such a large battery inside such a small form factor is indeed awe-dropping, as Apples event today was dubbed. Still, it feels incomplete. Like it should have something else attached to it. Say, oh, I dont know, another iPhone Air, bolted onto its side by a hinge, so when you open it up, you get an iPhone with a massive display. Of course, thats exactly what I think Apple had in mind when designing the Air. Not a thin phone for its own sake, but a trial run of a device that had less of the consumer in mind and more of Apples future iPhonesthe foldable ones with two screens. At 5.6 millimeters thin, Apples engineers have proved they can make a ridiculously thin iPhonewhich means they could fuse two of the ridiculously thin iPhones together to create a compelling foldable iPhone that, even when folded shut, is still not much thicker than the iPhone 17 Pro of today. It’s why I can’t help but feel the Air is clearly an intermediary step between the mono-screen iPhone weve known for nearly 20 years and the foldable iPhones that will define the next 20 yearsa future where each and every iPhone family member eventually has two screens: one on the front and a larger one inside. But that multiscreen device that Apple is ultimately transitioning the iPhone to become wont be ready until next year. And it feels like Apple thought that, in the meantime, if it could release half of its future devices to the public now to juice sales and make the single-screen iPhone look less 2010s in 2025, then thats what it should do. And now it has. The iPhone Air is a great stopgap until we get to the real next-generation iPhone next yearthe first one with two screens, which I feel, like the iPhone Xs all-screen design back in 2017, will ultimately become the norm for every iPhone over the next decade. More consumers are ditching mono-screen phones for dual-screen foldables And Apples transition from the nearly two-decade-old single-screen bar or slab phone design to a dual-screen foldable cant come soon enough. Samsung has been making foldables since 2019. I used to make fun of them until I tried a Galaxy Z Fold5 a few years ago and had a sort of nostalgic epiphany. When I held the companys glorious dual-screen foldable in my hand, I had flashbacks to the thoughts I had the first time I held an original iPhone back in 2007: This is the phone of the future. Samsungs new Galaxy Z Fold7 (and Galaxy Z Flip7) are even better. Googles new Pixel 10 Pro Fold also makes me think the future of smartphones is dual-screen foldables. And the numbers are showing that, increasingly, consumers do, too. A report from Grand View Research last year found that interest in foldables has skyrocketed since the first ones emerged from Asia in 2018. By 2023, when foldables began catching on worldwide, they had an annual market cap of around $27.79 billion. In 2024, that number jumped to $34.7 billion. By 2030just five years from nowthe market cap of foldable phones is expected to nearly triple, to over $74 billion per year. As for why, foldable phones with dual screens are simply more versatile. These smartphones can switch between a compact form and a tablet-sized display, providing users with more screen space for multitasking, gaming, and media consumption without compromising portability, Grand View Research noted in its report. That portability is compromised even less when the unfolded phone is made super thinsomething Apple has now shown it can achieve with the launch of the iPhone Air. Which is why the iPhone Air feels less like a finished product and more like a preview of a radical design shift still to come. In that future, all iPhones could be dual-screen foldables, and the single-screen model may one day join the home-button iPhone as a relic of the past. The Air Apple announced today is a step toward that future, not the destination itself.
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E-Commerce
Fast Companys creative director, Mike Schnaidt, breaks down the Manuka Slab typeface and explains why it was chosen for the summer issue of the print magazine. If you’re looking for a bold serif with personality, Manuka Slab might be just the font you need.
Category:
E-Commerce
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