Jason Neiffer, Ed.D.

a white borzoi puppy with black ears and tan eyebrows sits on gray flooring. she looks up with wide puppy eyes, her front spindly legs planted firmly on the floor in front of her.

a close up of Mandy the borzoi puppy. we've caught her with her tongue sticking out in the early moments of a blep. her white whiskers are pronounced from this angle.

Mandy sits in profile as she poses in front of tall green flower stalks. she has a black spot on her left hip that looks like a heart.

This is Mandy. She has been told she has certain noodle-like qualities. Takes it as a compliment though, because everyone loves noodles. 13/10 (IG: spacecitysighthounds)

I Just Stood Up And Clapped After Merriam-Webster Said This In Their New Ad "In a world of AI slop, be a Merriam-Webster."

Merriam-Webster's new AI ad is hilarious — and just a little unsettling.

Funny because it's true. Also… a little too true.

www.buzzfeed.com/bellaarnold/...

The problem is jumping in without asking, "Does this solve our problem?"

🧠 Think slow. Implement slower.
📎 The Street: Salesforce AI Faces Backlash from Customers

Yet another AI cautionary tale: Salesforce's customers are pushing back after promised AI magic turned into frustration.

We keep mistaking new for useful. Kahneman called it the illusion of understanding.

This framing gets it. Assessment in the AI era isn't a puzzle to solve; it's a balancing act we'll never finish. We should expect messiness and make space for it institutionally.

onedtech.philhillaa.com/p/on-...

Where do ethics and artistry meet when AI helps write?
Powerful reflection on the creative boundaries of AI from NYT Magazine:
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/04/ma...

I used NotebookLM to create a personal wiki — here's how you can do it, too Build a searchable knowledge base for your projects

Google's NotebookLM continues to impress—this time as a platform for creating your own personal wiki.

NotebookLM is another small step toward making thoughtful AI use more accessible to everyone.

🔗 www.androidpolice.com/noteboo...

80% of ransomware attacks now use artificial intelligence | MIT Sloan

Ransomware with AI isn't just faster... it's more convincing. Imagine a phishing email crafted in a perfect student or staff voice. This is a call to action to prepare for it!

mitsloan.mit.edu/ideas-made-t...

Perplexity launches AI email assistant that can manage your Outlook or Gmail inbox for you — but it will cost $200 a month Perplexity's $200 subscription is gaining a new feature that lets it manage your inbox by drafting replies to threads, scheduling meetings, and labeling emails using a new AI email assistant.

This is cool, but, the $200 level???

www.windowscentral.com/artifi...

Niche for sure, but very thoughtful approach!

www.petfoodindustry.com/pet-f...

If spotting AI is basically a coin flip, "gotcha" policies won't help kids learn. Let's double down on smart task design, visible drafts, and clear AI-use norms. Good read: cacm.acm.org/research/as-good...

AI isn't "killing" CS—it's changing it. Fundamentals + systems thinking + QA + security = durable. Great ASU Q&A.
fullcircle.asu.edu/fulton-sch...

AI Is Much More Evolutionary Than Revolutionary The belief that AI signals an entirely new, dangerous phase of human history is the motivation behind much of the drive for stringent and global regulation. But the evidence does not support the assertion that AI is a fundamentally unique technology, much less the conclusion that stringent AI regulation is warranted.

AI feels big, but history says evolution > revolution. Good reminder to keep our heads, not our hype.

Worth a read from ITIF/David Moschella.

itif.org/publications/2025/09...

Okay. I’ll bite. Why?

Welcome to the Frontier Learning Lab!

Let's explore the frontier... together!

Thanks to new legislative funding, we’re launching the Frontier Learning Lab (FLL)—a statewide initiative from Montana Digital Academy to equip students, educators, and schools for the AI-powered, XR-infused world ahead.

Cartoon style illustration of Caitlin wearing a red tee shirt holding a wrench beside Jason wearing a suit and holding a power drill and an orange robot.

AI feels abstract until you build a bot that solves tomorrow morning’s lesson-plan problem.

This week, Caitlin and Jason piloted Frontier Learning Lab’s Build-a-Bot Workshop at the MTPLC August Institute in Missoula.

Meet the FLL AI Help Desk: Real People, Real Answers, Right When You Need Them TL;DR: Educators in Montana (and beyond!) are invited to utilize the Frontier Learning Lab's AI Help Desk at ai.help@montanadigitalacademy.org.

MTDA's Frontier Learning Lab opens its AI Help Desk for educators, the first in the nation!

ai.help@montanadigitalacademy.org

Read more here! frontierlearninglab.substack.com/p/meet-the-f...

#AIinEducation #DigitalLearning #MTDA #BigSkyCountryLeads #GenerativeArtificialIntelligence

Need support navigating AI in your classroom or school?

The Frontier Learning Lab AI Help Desk is open for K–12 educators in Montana... and beyond!

🧠 Real answers. No jargon. Just support.


→ aihelp@mdta.org

Find out more about the Lab at frontierlearninglab.substack...

A man wearing a bright red button-up shirt and tan high-waisted pants walks along a city sidewalk, holding a black shoulder bag. He has short curly hair, glasses, and a mustache.

Well. With the development of AI over the last two weeks (Antropic's Claude connectors are mindblowing... I have a full-blown digital assistant working with Claude and Obsidian), I am on the lookout for these pants, coming to a JCPennys near you.

Midwestern water tower with the text "Save the em dash!" painted on the side.

Who is with me? #iykyk

🏞️ Learn, Connect & Innovate in Beautiful Missoula, Montana!

📅 July 15-17, 2025
🏫 Phyllis J. Washington College of Education | University of Montana

Each Montana school gets 1 free registration!

Secure your spot today! zurl.co/wFJQt

MTDA Clearinghouse Spotlight: Cascade Public Schools

Cascade Public Schools is proving that even small, rural schools can lead in digital education. In partnership with the MTDA Clearinghouse program, local teachers instruct with online content to expand their student opportunities.
zurl.co/NEnYZ

One of the great ironies of AI writing is that the only people who can detect it with accuracy are people who use AI for writing a lot (at least if you take a majority vote among five such people)

Non-users are no better than chance, and AI detectors are also less accurate. arxiv.org/pdf/2501.15654

Speak at Montana’s Most Innovative Education Symposium! 🚀 🌞💻

🌿 Share your innovative ideas and expertise with our learning community! Submit your proposal today.

Innovation Runs Through It
📅 July 15-17, 2025 | Missoula, MT

zurl.co/toIh1

Montana Digital Academy is honored to be recognized as a 2025 Discovery Education School of the Year! 💻 🎉 🌎

The Discovery Education Awards recognize schools that showcase the pinnacle of education through creativity and dedication.

Check out these amazing folks! 🎉 Many of them have been inspiring Montana students with MTDA since 2010! 🤯 These dedicated educators are located all across our beautiful state, proving that no matter where you are in Montana, incredible teachers are making a difference. ❤️

The Document is the Prompt: The Two Quiet Superpowers of Today’s AI Tools The rapid speed of AI development and evolution conceals two profound features evident across all of the "frontier" models. First, context windows are now long and becoming longer.

Speaking of prompting...

www.linkedin.com/pulse/docume...

Ladies and gentlemen... the weekend. (also: you are important and are not alone 🧡)

Reports of the Death of Prompting are Greatly Exaggerated Prompting Isn’t Dead—It’s Evolving into a New Literacy A recent Wall Street Journal article argues that the "hottest AI job of 2023"—"prompt engineering"—is already becoming obsolete. It’s a catchy…

Is prompting dead?? No.

www.linkedin.com/pulse/report...

No elephants: Breakthroughs in image generation When Language Models Learn to See and Create

No elephants: Breakthroughs in image generation www.oneusefulthing.org/p/no-elephan...

This is a great explanation on how recent image generation advancements work!