Amod

Just came back from mentoring a student hackathon and here’s my general view on AI, coding and how it is impacting students: - Everybody is churning out code using AI. Which is fine, we do it too. But the problem lies in students not focusing on the basics at all. I asked one team which tech stack did they use, they mentioned Tailwind, when I checked the code it was vanilla CSS. So I ended up spending a lot of time with each team, helping them a little with the basics and how they can proceed ahead. - There is no thinking involved. For example, a solution built for accessibility had nothing to do with accessibility. When asked about it, the default answer was “We do not know how to code, and this is what AI did for us”. - The patience level is decreasing (thanks to Instagram and short form of content as well). Since learners do not need to go through documentation, and Stack Overflow anymore and are used to quick fixes, the patience level is decreasing. A team was facing CORS error and kept asking me for the solution because they spent an hour asking ChatGPT to solve it and it didn’t. What I advised them is, to learn more about how things work and why the error happens in the first place. All in all, AI is a great help, but it isn’t a shortcut to learning. If you are a student, please please focus on the foundation. It is still as important as it was a few years back (maybe even more). Learn how machines work. Learn how internet works. This is never getting old.