6047 - Education and Employment in the AI Era
In-Person Course | Registration opens 9/8/2026 10:00 AM EDT
The emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) has already had significant impacts on education policies and practices. It has also begun to affect the labor market, especially the entry-level white-collar occupations. This course will blend concepts related to pedagogy, cognitive psychology, economics, psychometrics and sociology to explain how learning and labor may evolve over the next decade. We will explore:
- How children learn
- How technology is infiltrating the learning environment
- How learning and cognition are measured (for both people and AI models)
- How AI holds both promise and perils for the learning process
- What types of tasks are well suited for AI-based automation
- How employers are reacting to the potential impacts of AI
This course will be offered in-person at George Mason University.
Steve Shapiro
Steve Shapiro has taught several courses for Encore Learning including the AI session for the Technology Hot Spots course in 2024. He also is the coordinator of the Tech Hobbyist Club and the Current Events Club. He studied economics at Tufts University and then did graduate studies in management at the Sloan School at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. For 25 years he served as an executive and management consultant for many technology-centric businesses in the DC area. Then he taught high school math in Fairfax County for 15 years. The course will reflect his experiences as both a business manager and classroom teacher.