The 5.9-Hour Gift: I Returned to High School English Just in Time for the AI Revolution

Returning to the classroom after years away gives me a unique lens to share. Generative AI is our chance to finally prioritize what matters in public education: personal ethics.

When I walked back into the high school classroom this past January to teach Honors English II, after 22 years away, I knew the landscape would look different. I spent years in the real estate and healthcare worlds focusing on ethical leadership and values-aligned cultures. Returning to the classroom was a deliberate choice, but I did not expect to step directly into the middle of a real-time reinvention. In my fourteen years in public education, I dreamed of a system that supported student autonomy and encouraged a deep love of curiosity and learning. I see that possibility clearly now.

As we enjoy these summer months and look ahead to the upcoming 2026-2027 school year, teachers are asking the same anxious questions: How do we stop students from cheating? How do we police AI use? How do we protect the old ways of writing and thinking? How do we stop them from giving away their thinking?

I want to explore some different questions: How do we use this moment to make our classrooms truly student-driven and teacher-supported? How do we help students finally and truly own their learning?

During my years working with organizational values and culture, I learned that people thrive when they feel aligned with a clear purpose. The same is true for high school sophomores. If we treat school like a game of compliance, students will use any tool available to automate their way to a grade. But if we invite them into a creative studio where their actual voice matters, the game literally becomes about how they can reach higher and learn more.

This is where the real opportunity of generative tools comes into play. Recent studies suggest that when teachers learn to integrate these thought partners thoughtfully into their preparation, they save an average of 5.9 hours per week.

I don’t know about you, but as I plan for the fall, I can make excellent use of that time.

In the old days of teaching, those hours were consumed by drafting repetitive rubrics, generating reading comprehension questions, and formatting worksheets. Sifting through grading took up far too much of our precious energy. Today, I can use a digital tutor to help me scaffold a complex reading assignment in seconds. I can generate five different reading level options for a historical text, or instantly create a targeted vocabulary exercise tailored to my students’ interests.

Better yet, students can create all of that for themselves. The possibility is right there. Our students can get deep into their own data and design a tutor for themselves that helps them fill gaps in learning in a matter of hours. That is revolutionary, helpful, and is where true learning happens.

That time I got back does not belong to the computer. It belongs to the teenagers sitting in my classroom. A digital mentor handles the administrative skeleton, freeing the human teacher to provide the soul connection.

Those five extra hours (and I would argue more) are now spent walking around the room, kneeling beside a student to help clarify a thesis, or listening to a quiet student who finally found the courage to speak up about a poem because they feel supported.

My namesake, Charles Dickens, wrote during the Industrial Revolution. He saw how easily systems can treat people like gears in a rigid assembly, especially in public education. Imagining my classroom as we prepare for a new year, I see the opposite potential. We have a historic opportunity to redesign public education from the ground up, making it more personal, more creative, and more ethical. I believe it starts with the students and teachers. If we adapt within the system, the system will be forced to adapt to us.

We do not need to fear the future of writing, reading, and thinking. We just need to teach our students how to stand on the shoulders of these ever-evolving tools, using them as guides to reach higher vantage points of original thought.

I am glad to be back, and I am incredibly optimistic about where we are heading next.

Stay awake. Stay curious. Stay ethical. Stay human.