This Week in Startups Magic School uses AI to help kids learn, not cheat | E2196
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Oct 22, 2025 Adeel Khan, founder of Magic School and a former school principal, reveals how AI can transform K–12 education by empowering teachers and enhancing student learning without merely facilitating cheating. He explains the innovative teacher co-pilot features and discusses how AI can support novice educators in lesson planning. Meanwhile, Kris Canete introduces his company, On The Fly Energy, which creates modular flywheel energy storage systems, offering an efficient solution to strengthen the power grid, and compares it with traditional battery technology for energy resilience.
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Mix Models To Cover Real Classroom Needs
- Current large language models meet most classroom needs, but gaps remain in guardrails and audio handling.
- Magic School mixes providers (Anthropic, OpenAI, 11 Labs) to address different modalities and constraints.
Scaffold Student AI Use By Age
- Limit AI use for younger students to avoid cognitive offload and scaffold usage by grade.
- Use AI primarily for formative feedback (e.g., instant essay critiques) while preserving students' own cognitive work.
Student Chooses Responsible AI Use
- A tenth grader described using Magic School's writing feedback tool to revise essays and deliberately avoiding cheating.
- Adeel saw this as evidence students can learn thoughtful, agency-driven AI practices.