Advancing the Future of Learning: Policy, Higher Education, and AI
On September 23, 2025, the SOM & Society Professional Alumni Group opened its webinar series with Professor Seth Zimmerman, joined by chairs Sooah Rho '23, Billy Huang '20, and Brandon Jones '23. The session zeroed in on three levers education leaders can act on now: make school choice simpler, clarify the value of college, and use AI to strengthen-not replace-human judgment.
School Choice That Works For Families: The New Haven Case
New Haven once ran a school choice process that pushed parents into high-stakes bets. If a family missed their top pick, alternatives were often gone, so success depended on predicting acceptance odds as much as preferences.
Zimmerman's team surveyed families, documented common errors, and recommended a redesign. In 2019, the district adopted a new approach and rolled out digital tools covering both charter and public schools, making it easier for families to compare options and make better decisions.
- Design from the family's point of view. Reduce guesswork, cut steps, and present clear trade-offs.
- Research-to-policy takes time. Build partnerships early, test changes, and plan for iterative updates.
- Quick wins for district leaders: run usability tests with real families, publish plain-language guides, offer simple choice calculators, and set defaults that prevent costly mistakes.
What College Is Worth-and For Whom
Higher education remains a strong engine for mobility and growth. It is not the best path for everyone-skilled trades matter-but on average, the earnings premium is substantial.
Despite rising sticker prices, the net price has fallen for many students because of financial aid, while the return on investment has grown on average. The risk side has also increased as students shoulder more costs through debt, and graduating into weak job markets can magnify that risk.
- Focus on completion. The earnings premium depends heavily on finishing.
- Track program-level outcomes, not just institutional averages.
- Strengthen advising and work-based learning to tighten the school-to-work link.
Debt Risk and Policy Guardrails
Policies like income-driven repayment and targeted forgiveness reduce downside risk for students, especially those entering lower-paying fields or public service. These tools make the investment in college more resilient to macroeconomic shocks.
- Share clear guidance on income-driven plans: studentaid.gov/manage-loans/repayment/plans/income-driven
- Promote awareness of public-service options: studentaid.gov/manage-loans/forgiveness-cancellation/public-service
- Integrate repayment literacy into first-year orientation and exit counseling.
AI's Role: Amplifying Human Decision-Making
Zimmerman outlined a practical future in which AI complements expert judgment. As AI handles routine analysis, skills like critical thinking, synthesis, and collaboration become more valuable, not less.
MBA programs, including those at leading schools, hold their edge when they develop people who can frame problems, weigh trade-offs, and lead teams across functions. AI can assist with analysis, but it does not replace judgment, context, or relationships.
- Embed AI across the curriculum: sourcing data, checking model outputs, and presenting decisions with evidence and caveats.
- Shift assessments toward process, oral defense, and real constraints to reduce shortcutting.
- Teach prompting, verification, and disclosure norms; set clear policies for academic integrity.
- Invest in data literacy for faculty and students to raise the floor on quality.
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The Throughline for Education Leaders
Design systems around real people making real decisions. Reduce risk where stakes are high. Use AI to extend human judgment, not to sidestep it.
That combination-better design, smarter safeguards, and human-centered learning-gives students and educators a fair shot at better outcomes, across K-12 and higher ed.
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