Why Schools Still Feel Like Factories — And What We’re Missing About Students
Notes and reflections from my conversation with Carl Morris & Saif Sarwar
There’s a strange paradox in education today.
We live in a world filled with AI tools, instant answers, infinite content, and unprecedented access to knowledge.
And yet — walk into most schools, and they still operate like factories built in the 19th century.
Rows. Bells. Tests.
Efficiency over curiosity.
Rote learning over real understanding.
But the more time I spend speaking with educators, founders and students, the more convinced I am that our problem isn’t technology.
It’s perspective.
And that became very clear during my recent conversation with Carl Morris and Saif Sarwar, two educators who have spent years building online schools, supporting teacher-founders, and experimenting with personalization far beyond buzzwords.
This article captures the key ideas from that discussion — but I promise: the full episode goes much deeper.
1. The most surprising thing about students today
I opened the interview with a simple question:
“What recently surprised you about schools or young people?”
Saif didn’t need time to think.
He talked about how politically, socially, and culturally engaged today’s students are.
They’re plugged into global issues.
They’re worried about AI, careers, climate, fairness, identity.
They’re asking big questions adults often underestimate.
But something troubling happens later in their school journey.
Those questions disappear.
Not because kids stop being curious — but because the system slowly trains them to ask only one thing:
“Is this on the exam?”
And that’s when learning becomes memorization.
2. Rote learning isn’t dying — it’s winning
Carl shared something I can’t stop thinking about:
“In the face of massive technological change — first the internet, now AI — rote learning is still the main output of most school systems.”
Why?
The system is under pressure
Mass education is hard
Teachers are overworked
Changing assessment is risky
Creativity takes time schools don’t have
And yet, when Carl and Saif launched an online school, they noticed something strange:
Even when students had access to interactive tools, videos, experiments, and games…
they kept choosing rote-learning paths unless guided out of them.
Not because they loved it.
But because it felt safe, familiar, and “school-like.”
This is a bigger problem than we admit.
3. What if learning didn’t feel like “learning”?
Carl described “real learning” as something different:
learning song lyrics
mastering a game
understanding a weird fact
asking a question nobody expects
But none of that feels like school.
In the classroom, learning is defined as memorize and regurgitate.
He told a story about a student who once asked:
“Why is water wet?”
He used it to teach chemistry and the nervous system in one lesson.
Later someone asked, “Why don’t crabs have eyebrows?”
These aren’t silly questions.
They’re the gateway to real understanding.
And yet these questions die off by age 15.
Because the system kills them.
4. AI won’t replace teachers — it might revive creativity
This is the part of the conversation that surprised me most.
We often hear that AI will automate teaching, grading, lesson planning, content creation.
Carl’s view is different.
He believes AI’s biggest contribution will be:
Bringing back the curiosity that the system has squeezed out of students.
Kids might not ask a “stupid” question out loud…
but they will ask an AI.
And if teachers receive anonymized feedback about student questions, they can build lessons around the things kids actually wonder about — not just what the syllabus mandates.
AI becomes:
a non-judgmental companion
a creativity amplifier
a diagnostic tool
a source of real-time insight into student moods, interests, and confusion
Not a robot teacher.
A reflection layer that helps humans make better decisions.
5. The personalization myth
Everyone’s talking about personalization.
Few can define it.
Here’s the common mistake Carl sees in the EdTech world:
“People think personalization is just a TikTok-style algorithm serving the next video.”
That’s content sequencing.
Not personalization.
Real personalization looks like this:
noticing when a student is tired
sensing anxiety or boredom
adjusting tone, pace, difficulty
changing context when something becomes sensitive
recognizing when a student needs encouragement, not instruction
Teachers do this naturally in one-on-one settings.
The challenge is scaling it to a classroom of thirty.
Carl believes AI will eventually read signals from students (voice, text, behavior patterns) and feed teachers actionable insights in real time.
Not replacing intuition — augmenting it.
6. Why this revolution will actually stick
Carl made a bold claim:
This is the educational technology that won’t get ignored.
Not because it’s perfect — it’s not.
But because kids are already using it.
Teachers are already using it.
Governments are quietly building with it.
And it’s not going back in the box.
He compared it to a future where teachers and students wear AR glasses:
Students receive instant answers.
Teachers receive instant questions.
Nobody is learning.
The current system simply can’t survive that reality.
Something has to evolve.
7. The future: decentralized, “pick & mix” schooling
This was one of my favorite insights.
Carl predicts a shift away from monolithic, centralized school systems toward:
niche schools
teacher-founded micro-programs
hyper-specialized online providers
modular curricula
mix-and-match learning pathways
Imagine taking:
Maths from a Bristol online school
Science from a Dubai innovation program
History from a Polish micro-school
Creative Writing from a teacher-founder in Sweden
All assessed externally, all accepted equally.
This is the direction they believe is coming — not suddenly, but gradually through “small mutations.”
And schools that stick rigidly to the old model simply won’t compete.
8. The most ignored voice in education
I asked Carl and Saif which “language” is ignored most often:
Teachers? Parents? Investors? Students?
Carl didn’t hesitate:
Students.
We talk about them endlessly.
Rarely do we talk to them.
And when we do, it’s usually in a way that doesn’t land.
The Slipknot story Carl shared says it all — when he tried to bond with a student through music, the student replied:
“Don’t care. You’re still old.”
Students don’t want adult imitation.
They want authenticity — and someone to ask them real questions like:
“What would you change about learning?”
When they’re allowed to respond, the ideas are remarkable.
Saif shared how students in the UAE used Replit and Lovable to prototype solutions in just a few hours — ideas many EdTech startups would pay to hear.
Students aren’t the problem.
They’re the missing stakeholder.
9. So what can teachers and founders do?
Carl gave two practical recommendations that I loved.
For teachers:
Try building one tiny tool with Replit or Lovable.
Just one.
Something that saves you five minutes a day.
The moment you see you can build things, your entire mindset shifts.
For EdTech founders:
Call your local school.
Visit. Observe. Talk to students. Talk to teachers.
Most founders are building blind.
One day inside a school can change the trajectory of your product.
10. The conversation we’re not having
If there’s one theme echoed throughout this episode, it’s this:
We cannot redesign education without students at the table.
Not as a symbolic gesture.
Not as a one-off interview.
Not as a “student voice panel.”
But as co-creators.
Co-designers.
Co-innovators.
This is the evolution we haven’t tried yet.
And maybe the only one that can work.
If this resonates… watch the full episode.
This article can’t capture all the nuance, humor, stories and depth Carl and Saif brought to the discussion.
The full interview is one of my favorite conversations so far — honest, challenging, inspiring, and full of practical insights for:
teachers
founders
school leaders
policymakers
and students
If you care about the future of education, you’ll get a lot from it.
👉 Watch the episode here
👉 Subscribe to Edtech Dots Podcast (the bigger the channel, the bigger the guests)
And as always — keep connecting the dots.