APLC CONSORTIUM · THREE-SESSION VIRTUAL SERIES

AI for Alberta School Leaders

Resources from the series with Rebecca Bultsma.

THE SERIES

Three sessions

Crow Logic, the Session 1 recap art: a crow perched on the words Crow Logic, with a walnut

SESSION 1 · TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2026

What AI Can Do, What It Can’t, and How Leaders Stay in Charge

View the slide deck
Session 2 title art: an early car, a crow on a walnut and an orange signal

SESSION 2 · TUESDAY, DECEMBER 1, 2026

From Tool Use to Responsible Practice: Policy, Privacy, and Trust

Slide deck coming soon
Session 3 title art: a weathered orange traffic light

SESSION 3 · TUESDAY, JANUARY 26, 2027

Assessment, Authenticity, and the Realness Problem

Slide deck coming soon

SESSION 1 · NOVEMBER 17, 2026

What AI Can Do, What It Can’t, and How Leaders Stay in Charge

  • Read the roadGet a handle on the landscape: the myths, the hype, the doom, and what it means for education.
  • Use what’s thereUse what’s available, and the powerful tools you already have.
  • Watch for trafficSafeguard student data, identify bias and understand AI’s limitations. Experimenting with AI comes with risks.
  • Wait for the lightRead the signals, and realize the importance of human judgment when we use AI.
  • Start smallGet started with a few small paper cuts.
Crow Logic, from the Session 1 slide deckRead the Road, from the Session 1 slide deckUse What's There, from the Session 1 slide deckWatch for Traffic, from the Session 1 slide deckWait for the Light, from the Session 1 slide deckPick One Walnut, from the Session 1 slide deck
Sticky notes, a paper clip and an orange pencil

WHERE TO START

The one prompt

If you keep one thing from Session 1, keep this. Replace [X] with a real task and paste it into the AI tool your division already uses.

THE ONE PROMPT

I'm trying to do [X]. Interview me one question at a time until you have enough information to help me.

Tap the prompt to select it, then copy into AI

Think smaller. AI helps most with the small, annoying, repeat jobs nobody gets to. Even Anthropic found that 8.6% of Claude Code tasks were small fixes it calls papercuts. Read the Anthropic article.

Good first jobs

  • Spot your blind spots
  • Argue with your plan
  • Prepare a hard conversation
  • Untangle a schedule
  • Review your last parent survey

BEFORE AI GOES INTO A JOB

Four checks before you step off the curb

Open each one.

1Purpose

Why am I doing it?

2People

Who does it affect?

3Proof

How will I check it?

4Protection

What information does it touch?

NEW INSIGHTS

Find something new in data you already have

Try these three prompts. Replace the brackets with your own material.

TWO SOURCES

Compare [source A] and [source B] for [decision]. Where do they agree, differ or add something the other cannot tell us? Cite both.

Tap the prompt to select it, then copy into AI
MORE AND LESS

Where do apparently opposite requests point to a shared need? Show the reasons people give. Keep genuinely different needs separate.

Tap the prompt to select it, then copy into AI
FEEDBACK AND A DRAFT PLAN

Compare this feedback with [draft plan]. Which needs does it address, leave unresolved or make harder? Show the comments and plan passages together.

Tap the prompt to select it, then copy into AI

PROMPT GUIDES

Two guides to keep

PROMPT GUIDE15 Strategic AI Prompts for EducatorsRebecca Bultsma

15 Strategic AI Prompts for Educators

Open the guide (PDF)
PROMPT GUIDE10 Prompts for Strategic ThinkingRebecca Bultsma

10 Prompts for Strategic Thinking

Open the guide (PDF)
Rebecca Bultsma

NEXT STEPS

My recommendations for next steps

Everything I read, listen to and use lives in two posts.

My AI Syllabus, a Substack post by Rebecca Bultsma

ALL MY RECOMMENDATIONS

My AI Syllabus

The podcasts, books, and newsletters I’d actually give to a friend who asked “where do I start?”

See all my recommendations
 My AI Toolkit: Updated for 2026, a Substack post by Rebecca Bultsma

MY FAVOURITE AI TOOLS

My AI Toolkit: Updated for 2026

The unsponsored pocket guide to the apps, tools, and sites that survived my three-year testing spree.

See my favourite AI tools

A FEW TO START WITH

Books

Podcasts

Newsletters

People to follow

Sources

Session 1
  1. Amii. (2026, April 29). Amii partners with Alberta government to bring AI literacy to K-12 classrooms. Link
  2. Anthropic. (2025, December 2). How AI is transforming work at Anthropic. Link
  3. ASBA. (2024, September 13). ASBA AI Policy Guidance [PDF]. Link
  4. BBC. (1998). The Life of Birds [Television series]. Companion page: Link
  5. Clarke, L. (2026, March 10). These diseases were thought to be incurable. Now AI is unlocking new treatments. BBC Future. Link
  6. CNN. (2026, September 9). Ex-Anthropic insider tells CNN how AI could kill all humans by 2030 [Video]. YouTube. Link
  7. Common Sense Media. (2026, August). Teens in the AI Era: Schoolwork and Skills That Matter. Link
  8. Cristol, D. A., Switzer, P. V., et al. (1997). Crows do not use automobiles as nutcrackers: Putting an anecdote to the test. The Auk, 114(2), 296-298. Link (DOI: 10.2307/4089172)
  9. Dellinger, A. (2026, November 6). Krispy Kreme is beating Nvidia, and that's not even the chip giant's biggest problem. Gizmodo. Link
  10. Foggatt, T. (2026, September 16). How, exactly, could A.I. kill us? The New Yorker. Link
  11. Futura Team. (2026, July 26). Will AI save us from climate disaster? Here's what nobody tells you. Futura-Sciences. Link
  12. IEA. (2025, April 10). Energy and AI. Link
  13. Lahiri, I. (2026, September 3). Before New York City, Norway had already banned AI in schools. Euronews. Link
  14. Lethbridge School Division. (2026). AI Usage Guideline. Link
  15. Martindale, J. (2026, August 3). AI companies are now racing to the bottom: crashing token prices and competitive models push companies to cut costs. Tom's Hardware. Link
  16. Mollick, E. (2026, October 20). Co-Existence. Link
  17. Nihei, Y. (1995). Variations of behaviour of Carrion Crows Corvus corone using automobiles as nutcrackers. Japanese Journal of Ornithology, 44, 21-35. Link
  18. Nihei, Y., & Higuchi, H. (2001). When and where did crows learn to use automobiles as nutcrackers? Tohoku Psychologica Folia, 60, 93-97.
  19. NPR & Platformer. (2026, September 16). Machine Gods [Podcast]. Link
  20. Parasuraman & Manzey. (2010). Complacency and bias in human use of automation: An attentional integration. Human Factors, 52(3), 381-410. DOI
  21. Petz, S. (2026, September 13). Could AI really 'kill all humans'? Breaking down the dire warnings about the technology's existential risk. CBC News. Link
  22. Pope Leo XIV. (2026, May 15). Magnifica Humanitas [Encyclical], para. 140. Vatican. Link
  23. Ribeiro, Singh, & Guestrin. (2016). "Why should I trust you?": Explaining the predictions of any classifier. KDD 2016. Link
  24. Rogelberg, S. (2026, January 30). Gen Z believes using AI is making their colleagues dumb and lazy, but may paradoxically see it as key to their own promotion, Wharton says. Fortune. Reports a survey by Wharton, Gallup and the Walton Family Foundation. Link
  25. Roose, K. (2026, October). The AGI Chronicles. Article about the book: Link
  26. Sataua, T. (2026, November 6). OpenAI wants to win over data-center opponents by calling them 'compute campuses' and promising local benefits. Fortune. Link
  27. Strömberg, D., Lei, V., & Wu, Y. (2026). The generative AI learning penalty: Evidence from Chinese secondary education. CEPR Discussion Paper 21577. VoxEU column: Link
  28. Wikipedia. (n.d.). Mechanical Turk (overview). Retrieved November 14, 2026. Link
  29. Zimmer, A., & Zimmerman, A. (2026, September 2). NYC schools to ban AI in 2-K through 8th grade and limit screen time. Chalkbeat New York. Link
Photo credits

Footage: crow footage from BBC, The Life of Birds (1998).