Schools Are Missing the Biggest Opportunity AI Has Ever Given Us

I don’t know if this is an article or a venting session, but let me tell you what happened this weekend.

The Study Session That Changed My Perspective

I was studying with my kids, and I realized something important. My son has a lot of potential. He studies hard, but he doesn’t have a way to study. And honestly, that’s the most important part.

We’ve discussed this so many times before: AI is not there to give kids the answers. Maybe it can do that, but that’s the worst way to use it.

So I sat down with him, and together we crafted a method. A way of studying that actually makes sense.

The Five-Step Framework

Here’s what we came up with:

1. Understand the mission — Using his own words. What do you need to study? How will the test look like? What’s actually being asked?

2. Plan your time — And here’s the key: start from the end, not from the start. Work backwards from the deadline.

3. Study actively — Use mind maps, handwritten notes, things that activate your brain. Not just staring at a laptop screen.

4. Write, color, repeat — Engage multiple senses. Make it stick.

5. Final check — Verify everything is covered. No surprises.

I wrote this down, asked AI to help me rephrase it clearly, and created a one-pager for him.

Then I Thought: What If We Made It Visual?

Kids don’t love reading walls of text. They prefer seeing things. So I used AI to create a poster version of the same framework.

And that’s when it hit me.

The Real Potential We’re Ignoring

Imagine what we could do with AI and teachers working together. Imagine taking the exact same content and tailoring it specifically to each child’s way of learning.

Because here’s the reality: we are all different.

Some kids are visual learners. Some need stories. Some need bullet points. Some need gamification.

This is where AI can genuinely help us create better outcomes. Not by replacing teachers, but by helping them customize content at a scale that was never possible before.

The Disconnect That Frustrates Me

Here’s where my venting begins.

In Italy, as far as I know, schools are not even using AI. In fact, I had a conversation with a teacher who told me: “No, you don’t need to use AI.”

But why?

That’s our world now. That’s where we are. Telling kids to avoid AI is like telling them to avoid the internet in 2005. It’s not just bad advice — it’s the worst advice ever.

Same Content, Four Different Ways

Let me give you a concrete example of what’s possible.

I took that same studying framework and asked AI to present it in four different ways:

• One version for my older son
• One version for my girlfriend’s daughter
• One version for my youngest

The content was identical. But the presentation? Completely different.

From a product manager’s perspective, this is everything. Same content, different user experience. And the difference in engagement and understanding was massive.

A Message to Educators

Please, stop saying “AI is bad” or “it’s not there yet.”

Instead, let’s experiment. Let’s figure out what kids can do with it, what they shouldn’t do with it, and most importantly — why.

Because here’s what I’ve learned: saying “no” without explanation is the fastest way to guarantee they’ll say “yes” behind your back.

The Future I’m Hoping For

I genuinely believe that one day, every piece of educational content will be 100% personalized and tailor-made based on how each individual’s brain works.

Not generic content for a class of 30 kids who all learn differently.

Customized content that requires less effort to absorb and leads to deeper understanding.

That’s the promise of AI in education. Not replacing human connection or critical thinking, but removing the friction that makes learning harder than it needs to be.

And honestly? That’s where AI can really help us. If we let it.