Henry Motte-de la Motte: AI Tutors, Global EdTech, and the $1M Parenting Dilemma – E591

"I think what's interesting is that's been borne out in our data. Our business model is tutor outsourcing, so we have tutors based in Asia and we staff them with tutoring and education companies around the world. Those companies have been implementing AI into their operations. They are competing with AI-only solutions. The feedback we're getting from clients is those who can afford it want a human component—they'll want that one hour of English, that one hour of math every week. Then, you know, the rest of the week they can do all sorts of other things, but they still want that human, regular touchpoint. Mm-hmm. And that's where we come in. We provide the teachers for that regular touchpoint." - Henry Motte-de la Motte, CEO of Edge Tutor 

"AI allows you to personalize. Those who can afford it will have the highest human element because those with the means have essentially AI-enabled human teachers. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. So you get the human element. There's also a trust element. You know what's so interesting is a lot of the guys in Silicon Valley talk, and you ask them how they raise their kids—no screen time. Make it make sense. It's classic NIMBYism, right? They're all for social equality, but please, not in my backyard. No social housing behind me. You have entire school systems trying to reduce the use of technology. Sweden has gone back to pen and paper because they've proven that you learn more when using pen and paper than digital devices." - Henry Motte-de la Motte, CEO of Edge Tutor 

"Most of my team—we use AI in our operations. We use it in teacher recruiting, we use it in teacher training. I half-jokingly tell all my colleagues like, 'Ask ChatGPT before you ask me, because ChatGPT is a lot smarter than me, and you know.' Mm-hmm. 'Only ask me if you still can't figure it out with the AI tools you use.' But that's quite different to how most people learn. Most of us are actually lazy learners. We're not in the 5% hyper-proactive learners. You can also be a very proactive learner for some topics, but not for others. I'm constantly learning about the space that I'm in. I used to speak Spanish, and I've been trying to learn it again over the last three years. I've signed up to a bunch of high-quality software solutions. I'm not learning Spanish because I'm just not motivated enough." - Henry Motte-de la Motte, CEO of Edge Tutor 

Henry Motte-de la Motte, CEO of Edge Tutor, and Jeremy Au reconnect two years after their last conversation to discuss how global tutoring has evolved. They examine the rise of AI in education, differences in learner motivation, and how human connection and structure remain critical to learning. They explore Edge Tutor’s expansion into 30 countries, the decision to stay focused on English and math, and how demographic and economic shifts are transforming education into a premium service. Their conversation also touches on the societal role of parenting, immigration, and childcare policy as key levers to address falling birth rates and education equity.

02:03 AI expanded fast but motivation gaps remain: AI tools help motivated learners but most people, especially K-12 students, need structure and accountability that only human tutors provide.

03:11 Edge Tutor scaled to 30 countries to manage market risk: The company grew from 6 to 30 countries including North America, South America, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific to avoid overdependence on any single market.

04:10 English and math make up 80 percent of tutoring demand: Despite requests for other subjects, Edge Tutor remains focused on English and math, which dominate global tutoring spend.

05:05 AI works better for adult learners than K-12 students: Adults often use AI tools effectively when motivated, while K-12 learners benefit more from a consistent human relationship for emotional and social learning.

06:29 Scheduled sessions with human teachers drive learning: Learners tend to skip self-paced AI tools but show up when sessions are fixed and prepaid with real tutors, just like gym or personal training.

13:42 Falling birth rates are driving premium education: With fewer children, parents concentrate resources, creating demand for small-group or 1-on-1 formats and AI-enabled human tutors, especially in wealthy families.

22:30 Immigration and childcare policies affect national birth rates: Countries like France maintain higher birth rates through subsidized early childcare while Spain increases immigration to balance aging populations and support their social systems.

(01:07) Jeremy Au: Hey Henry. Good to see you. 

(01:09) Henry: Hey Jeremy. Good to see you too. Thanks for having me.

(01:11) Jeremy Au: it's good to have a sequel episode, in person after our last thing that we did remote online, whatever that was, two years ago. 

(01:18) Henry: Two years, exactly. Yeah. 

(01:19) Jeremy Au: Why are you in Singapore? 

(01:20) Henry: I'm here for, two things. there's an endeavor event. And a founder's forum thankfully the two are at around the same time. I thought I'd pop in. 

(01:27) Jeremy Au: Yeah, very good. I think what's interesting is that, since it's been two years since the last episode, we're thinking about has the business changed in terms of the macro environment, your strategy approach how you yourself has changed as a leader and person as well. Could you introduce yourself? 

(01:42) Henry: Sure. I'm Henry Motte-de la Motte. I'm the, CEO and, founder of Edge Tutor. 

(01:47) Jeremy Au: Fantastic. I think, we did invest, in you. So there's the angle. I'm happy to see the progress you're making. I guess the first question I have is how has your company changed over the past two years? since we wrote that check, AI has (02:00) absolutely become a huge thing. I'm curious. How would you think about it?

(02:02) Henry: Yeah. So I think there's kind of like three things that have changed. It used to be the elephant in the room now is just the elephant in the park But AI is absolutely everywhere. I think we've always taken the contrarian view, which many in the education industry are taking, by the way, that an important role to be played by human educators.

(02:20) I think what AI will do is it'll accelerate the diversion between those who can afford a human educator and those who have to rely on more automated or software based solutions, which is, you know, not necessarily a great thing. But the, there's still a massive role to be played by human educators. I think what's interesting is that's been born out in our data, our business model is tutor outsourcing. 

(02:41) So we have, tutors based in Asia and we staff them with tutoring and education companies around the world. Those companies, have been implementing AI into their operations. They are competing with AI only solutions. the feedback we're getting. From clients is those who can afford it, want a human component, right? they'll want that one (03:00) hour of English, that one hour of math every week. Then, you know, the rest of the week, can do all sorts of other things, but they still want that human regular touchpoint.

(03:07) And that's where we come in. We provide the teachers for that regular touchpoint. the macro picture has changed in so many of our end markets. when I last spoke to you, I think we maybe operated in half a dozen countries.

(03:17) We're now in 30 countries around the world. Including all the large economies in North America, south America, middle East, and Asia Pacific. we've seen different trends in every market. China famously had a double reduction act, that kind of depressed demands in some part of the EdTech sector. The government hasn't changed the regulation, but it's become more relaxed around it. people in mainland China place a lot of emphasis on education and that never went away.

(03:41) In Europe you've had some reforms. For example, in the UK there's been some tax reforms which are actually increasing tutoring demand. Post covid the private sector in the US is going through its whole thing between the end of tutoring subsidies, which were covid related to a lot of changes being initiated by the new administration. And what's been interesting for (04:00) us is because we're multi-country, exposed to all of these macro shifts, but less reliant on any single market. That's part of our strategy as well, you just wanna diversify. the, third thing I would say is that when we last spoke, we've been very much English focused. we kept looking at the market and 80% of spend is on English and math. so it, made sense for us to go into math. We've been disciplined about not entering other subjects even when we're asked to. we're focusing on the 80, and the 80 is English and math. So that's what we're teaching in 30 countries. 

(04:30) Jeremy Au: Yeah, so obviously a lot of macro changes and fantastic to see. I think the company adapt there. I think what's interesting is unpacking each of these, pillars, right? first of all is the AI one, I have to say that I'm learning a lot from AI, right? If I don't understand something about biology, something to do some stuff like RNA and some, you know, some like technical component. Been using AI to explain stuff. And then also explain it at different levels of complexity. use, both in (05:00) historical lens, which is useful for me to understand historic, but also the metaphorical side to simplify it. as an adult learner, i'm curious from your perspective, why is it that AI, this approach doesn't really work for K 12 the way that they're describing? 

(05:13) Henry: So that's the funny thing. It does work, there's basically three elements. AI works best, like every single new tool in education, right? Going back to encyclopedias tapes the basic internet and 2.0 It's always down to the type of learner, one of the big issues we have in the tech world is we're always building for the 5%, which I mean, you're a classic in a way. you strike me as a classic, 5% learner. Very self-motivated, very educated already, always did well academically. very curious. it's really the self-motivation and the self-discipline that makes you the ideal use case.

(05:47) Most of my team, we use AI in our operations, We use it in teacher recruiting. We use it in teacher training. I half jokingly tell all my colleagues like, ask ChatGPT before you ask me, because ChatGPT is a lot smarter than me and (06:00) yeah only ask me if you still can't figure it out with the AI tools we use. But that's quite different to how most people learn. most of us are actually lazy learners. we're not in the 5% hyper proactive learners. You can also be a very proactive learner for some topics, but not for others. I'm constantly learning about the space that I'm in. I used to speak Spanish and I've been trying to learn it again the last, two years. I've signed up to a bunch of high quality software solutions.

(06:27) I'm not learning Spanish because just not motivated enough. that's the first thing it brings in that element of accountability. That element of motivation. And I know that the day I really wanna speak Spanish, I will sign up for Spanish classes with a human tutor. When I do that, I'll probably get the discipline to start doing homework and then all the tools become helpful. what's fascinating is some of the clients we're starting to get now are companies that didn't start out with tutors. They were software only solutions. they realized that for five, maybe 10% of learners, that's enough, but for 90%. They lack that (07:00) motivation, they need the guidance, they need a human to be coaching them throughout the learning journey. It's thinking about your relationship to learning rather than the pure knowledge. you are a motivated learner, the technology has been around for a very long time.

(07:14) My mother is from the Philippines. She speaks French better than my father, who's French. She is a language nerd. She locked herself up in the University of Geneva and for nine weeks went through every single, self-teaching material they had for French and now beats all of my French relatives at Scrabble and speaks without an accent, This is pre AI. Many decades ago, Are you an extremely motivated learner? that's what we're seeing. And that's why we're seeing growth in the K 12 segment where we operate but also in the adult segment. we're teaching English to executives in Mexico Brazil Spain and China. These are all adults like you who have, you know, they're already highly educated. They're already quite successful in their career. there's nothing stopping them with an AI tutor. it's not a cost issue, it's not an access issue, and yet they're (08:00) still signing up for. Half an hour, one hour, two hours a week with someone in the Philippines. And what I find fascinating. 

(08:06) Jeremy Au: Yeah. Well, that's what my mom always used to say you fall in love with somebody. That's the fastest way to learn English. And I was like, mom, are you saying. learn Chinese more. Yeah, and that's an interesting part, right? Because motivation is such a key thing, some people are motivated to learn English, some people are motivated to learn math. But the awkward reality is most people are only learning English because they have to, or they have to learn math because it's part of the curriculum.

(08:27) Henry: Yeah. Well, I push back a little bit. math definitely, because it's on the curriculum, people who enjoy math are a minority. English actually, what's quite endearing is. Even if you're studying it for academic or professional purposes, because it's the global language, there are a lot of positive benefits to learning English.

(08:46) Like you understand your Taylor Swift songs better, you can watch more Netflix, you can more easily travel, when it comes to learning English, There's a lot of joy, for the learners because it's better for you academically, professionally, (09:00) socially, travel wise, It is the global language. 

(09:03) Jeremy Au: let them watch Monty Python. 

(09:04) Henry: It just opens up, like there's so many things in terms of travel professional opportunities, studying abroad, and we find that the pleasure levels are quite high. as a result, people enjoy just interacting with a human.

(09:15) Jeremy Au: I think a contrarian or maybe an AI optimist would say, well, okay, maybe not for math because nobody wants to study math, but English as an example. this AI is gonna be happy to talk to you in English through chat. And then now we're learning on voice as well.

(09:30) Henry: Very realistic video avatar 

(09:31) Jeremy Au: and now they're adding there's this case to say if you can FaceTime or do a Zoom call with a remote English teacher, you can do it hundred times cheaper using a video AI avatar. How would you react to that statement?

(09:43) Henry: there's a couple of things. Ironically it can work really well with certain personality types. there's some AI tutors that do very well in parts of Northeast Asia. Where some learners are so shy that they don't even wanna practice with another human.

(09:55) Jeremy Au: Right. 

(09:55) Henry: And so there's some companies that are doing quite well there. So that's the first thing. there's a bit of a (10:00) personality element. The same way, for example, I have aspirations to sing better. It's. Possibly never gonna happen. I'm not comfortable taking singing lessons, but I have downloaded some AI powered singing apps, and I'll happily like, you know, sing off key to my phone.

(10:13) So I think, a lot of people have this with accent, you know, what holds us back when we're learning a languages, fear of sounding stupid with our accents. it's what's holding me back from practicing my Spanish. I have the grammar and the vocab. I'm not very comfortable in my accent. an AI tool can do incredibly well. I think you have to go back to what are you trying to pick up. there is a point where the technology is so advanced that the AI tool will behave like another human. The exchanges you're having with the AI tutor are the same as those with a human. we might get to a point, and in some sense already are at that point, but instinctively, humans are very imperfect in the way we think, the way we reason, the way we pronounce. If you're practicing the reality is that's what you need because the English you wanna speak is not to speak to a avatar, it speaks perfect English. It's to be able to speak (11:00) in English when you're traveling. It's people to speak in English when you're doing business so you wanna have. Essentially human experience to know how to deal with other humans. you're not just learning the language, it's also, you know, it's social, it is emotional learning too. Where I am more bullish on a human is if you're trying to learn how to relate to other humans, a human is probably the best way to get that.

(11:24) Jeremy Au: Yeah. 

(11:25) Henry: The third one is actually really interesting, and will depend on how we relate to machines. one of the most important things with tutoring specifically, is the accountability element. you prepay for a service at a set time. And you have to show up on that time. I have this with personal training where, if I go to the gym by myself, I'll cancel gym sessions I've paid for a personal trainer. I've got this sense of obligation and I will wanna show up it's the same thing with tutors. the reason I don't speak Spanish is I've already paid for all the apps. I've already paid for all the services. In theory, I could (12:00) learn Spanish at any point of the day or night, in practice I just don't. When you have a teacher once a week, you have to show up we ever get to a point where people will pay for a session with tutor and treat the machine the way they would treat a human? 

(12:14) Jeremy Au: yes, probably. 

(12:15) Henry: it's interesting, right? if you think about human behavior with apps right now, there's many apps where people sign up for a whole month. They're paying for the app. They have no sense of urgency of using it, so they don't use it. I've spent on so many meditation apps every year I renew, telling myself I'm gonna meditate every day and be a better person.

(12:32) I don't do it because there's no human. the three times I've had meditation sessions with humans, I was there on time showed up and participated. maybe it's a generational thing, Do people show up for software? let's say you sign up for a 3:00 PM session. The problem with software is that it's an infinite resource. There's all these things we should all be doing. All of us should be doing breath work in the morning, but most of us don't. when there's something that's good for you that you should do, but where there's no sense of urgency (13:00) most of us revert to just not doing it. this is why people have a weekly personal trainer, this is why people have a weekly English lesson.

(13:07) It's because Tuesday, 3:00 PM doesn't really matter. If you paid for it and have to show up. that accountability, is massive. if you paid for an AI tutor? Would you accept that you're only allowed to use it for that one slot at 3:00 PM on a Tuesday when you know there's no limitation What would make you agree that you're only allowed to practice at 3:00 PM if they say, you can practice whenever you want, when it's available all the time, people use it, not of the time. We've seen this with human tutors. services in the US that were selling into schools, and they were saying 24 7 tutoring available. Kids can use it anytime, any day. stats are that usage was around low single digit percent. 

(13:42) Jeremy Au: Okay. what's interesting is that, obviously we're talking about these trends. One interesting aspect is, demographics, right? the birth rate in these developed countries are low, right? Singapore is at 0.9, Korea is also around 0.9, but Seoul itself is 0.4. Europe is also around (14:00) 0.9 as well. Yeah. I mean, if you probably split out like recent immigrants would be high above rate. And local citizens are probably lower. Right? So this kind of interesting, from an education perspective compared to, spending on, economic security housing or travel experiences. I mean, there's so many different reasons. 

(14:17) Henry: Correct. people don't have children automatically. Becomes a conscious choice. when it's a conscious choice, people factor in budget lifestyle personal obligations career and all these things. the reality is Very often, having a kid in your twenties is disruptive.

(14:29) Jeremy Au: In some countries, people could look at it as to have a kid it's gonna cost me half a million dollars. maybe a million dollars depending on, 

(14:35) Henry: what your aspirations are where you live, 

(14:36) Jeremy Au: And you saw that in China where people are like, okay, it's better have one child and concentrate all resources from both sides of the family to give them the best start in life rather than. two or three kids. and what's interesting is that nobody has figured out how to. Get that birth rate up. Even France has a little bit of a bump, but it's very small. I'm just kind of curious because it seems like from education perspective, it feels like to me demographically it feels like birth rates are going down.

(14:58) So spend per (15:00) child is going up. I'm just curious how you see that. Because it feels like one aspect of talking to this education founder and his perspective was. becoming more premiumized, As a result of this. I was thinking through the implications of that statement

(15:12) Henry: I think I spend a bit too much time in education conferences But, it's something I really enjoy I meet up with clients, I meet up with advisors and I get to hear all sorts of different models being developed around the world. If you think about it for, the last century or so. You were wealthy, you still learned in a group environment, 

(15:28) Jeremy Au: right? 

(15:28) Henry: Right. You might have gone to a very elite private school. What we're now seeing is a lot of interesting models around, going back to the model of the last few centuries, which was, the most elite form of education is one-on-one. Or very small group. there's a very interesting school in the US called Fusion. you have your one hour of math class, one-on-one, then one hour of physics, and then you have one hour English, and still group activities and ways of socializing, 

(15:51) But you think about the very premium experience, a child can learn, and there's different schools of thought, some people say, the whole point of school is to socialize. one-on-one is not that great (16:00) from a social development perspective. What we're moving towards, is more premium education. one of the ways you go premium is you constantly reduce, the ratio of learners to teachers. it's fascinating to see, AI allows you to personalize. Those who can afford it will have the highest human element because, those with the means have essentially AI enabled human teachers. So you get the human element. Also trust element. You know what's so interesting is a lot of the guys in Silicon Valley. You ask them how they raise their kids, no screen time. make it make sense. It's classic nimbyism, right?

(16:36) They're all for social equality, but please not in my backyard, no social housing behind me. you have entire school systems trying to reduce, the use of technology. Sweden has gone back to pen and paper because they've proven that you'll learn more when using pen and paper than digital devices. But again, it's an income thing. are we gonna see in low or mid income countries one-on-one? AI powered tutors. No, you're gonna have a group (17:00) class of 15, 20, 30 people, there's gonna be a software solution where we can't afford, human tutoring but here's a very high quality AI tutor. Go play with Conmigo and you can learn. 

(17:09) In fact, they'll probably learn faster because they're so sharp. they can just keep going back and forth with the AI tutor, what worries me is what happens to the other 95%. Right. And I think that's the angle that we're trying to play, our teachers are from a lower income country. when we supply our teachers into the us, into Europe, into the Middle East, my hope is that we can make human-centric education more affordable in mid and high income countries, I don't have an answer for low income countries, including the Philippines. 

(17:39) Jeremy Au: I think that's the, crux of the issue education is a function of how much money you put into it at some level, right? Absolutely. You know, and then obviously a teacher costs money, alright? And that's pegg to your GDP per capital and your cost of living. In every country, I was just looking at San Francisco and you know what's interesting, I was looking at it was that, you know, obviously there's a public system where it's free, but it (18:00) takes a ballot. To get in. for parents who are not happy with where the ballot is They'll go to a private school and pay 40,000 US per year. 

(18:08) Henry: you're paying half a million for K 12.

(18:10) Jeremy Au: So you're paying for effectively 13 years, back to back. That's about half a million dollars. 

(18:14) Henry: adjust for inflation. Plus college, you're at a million bucks. 

(18:16) Jeremy Au: Yeah. education's not unless you go to state university and even so there's still quite a chunk So probably, yeah, after a million dollars of cost. if you're an American, I'll be like, wait a moment. Why am I gonna have that additional kid? And also Who has a million dollars? and of course parents obviously, I think to themselves, okay, I'm not with tier two, tier three school, if the ballot gave me a tier two, tier three. I mean, every parent wants the best their kid, right? Correct. So I think there's just a little bit of that. Cost and tension. 

(18:41) Henry: there's that massive tension. Right? And so it's interesting because, when you were saying what is it gonna take to reverse, the falling birth rates? it's not going into a version of the Handmaid's Tale where you force everyone to have kids, but it probably goes through massively lowering the cost of having kids.

(18:55) Jeremy Au: Yeah. 

(18:55) Henry: the reason the birth rates are falling is that the distribution of (19:00) children is roughly the same. if you look at the population, before maybe 75% were having kids. X percent we're having one kid X percent, we're having two x percent, we're having three x percent, we're having four. That bell curve has not changed as much as you think. The biggest issue is that a lot of people are just completely opting out of having kids. massively compressing that bell curve.

(19:21) And you just have as a whole, just a lot less kids being born in society. And, you know, I go back to Singapore. I did econ history as my major for undergrad. I loved when we studied Southeast Asia, the Asian tigers rising through the seventies, eighties, and nineties. The conventional theory is like, oh, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore. The reason they did so well was because these were like export led hyper capitas societies. And actually the thing they were teaching us, in my slightly left-leaning university in London was well. They also had fantastic institutions they massively invested in public housing and in public K 12 education

(19:58) They didn't try to build the (20:00) Stanford of Singapore but it was give people super good quality, Subsidized social housing. Which would probably have a bigger dent on child rearing in Europe and the US if suddenly housing costs go down dramatically, people can just physically the space to have kids.

(20:17) Jeremy Au: Right. 

(20:17) Henry: And the school locations will be a lot less expensive. And the salaries of those who operate the school, which are a direct function of the cost of living. also go down. So you thought we're gonna talk about education and AI and the solution is actually low cost housing. 

(20:31) Jeremy Au: it's true. When we talk about education, we're talking about parents as customers, and the state that is supporting these parents, we're also talking about the people who are benefiting from this, which should be the children, right? The truth is that less and less children every generation, and parents are feeling more and more insecure about the economic future, about having kids. So I think it's, all tied together I was reading Reddit thread and, you know, they simply like, are you gonna have kids or not?

(20:54) And then maybe a quarter was like, the world is gonna end because of climate change. So why am I (21:00) raising kids? I think it comes across as sad because as a parent, I love my children. instead of resigning, to never having kids, do we need to change society and take action so that people feel comfortable? I totally understand it. the system feels huge. The climate change problem seems unsolvable. So I think feeling helpless 

(21:16) Henry: it's a rational reaction. 

(21:18) Jeremy Au: Yeah. It's a rational reaction, from us who are passionate about education and reforming the system, hopefully we can take some action. Let's talk about those actions, In America. a million dollars. To raise a kid. Obviously people may argue when it's half a million dollars, but nobody's arguing is around the range. 

(21:31) Henry: Everyone agrees that it's overpriced 

(21:32) Jeremy Au: do you think, hypothetically if The price of education dropped by a factor of 10 and everything else dropped by a factor of 10. Do you think that would raise, birth rates and by how much or do you think it also wouldn't really solve the problem?

(21:46) Henry: I think I'm really speaking with third hand information, but it's, a, you know, every complex problem you know, complex solutions, and so it's never gonna be a silver bullet. I think it would be a step in the right direction. another big one, which is kind of like education slash social (22:00) care is all around childcare, right? We talk about birth rates in Europe, but actually Europe is a tale of different countries. there are countries that have childcare. Why does France have a higher birth rate than Germany? one of the key reasons is because. in Germany is, very inadequate. 

(22:15) Jeremy Au: Yeah. 

(22:15) Henry: And childcare in France is, like a nursery as early as three or four months. It makes a massive impact, right. otherwise, all the burden falls on the woman and, has to sacrifice her career, et cetera, it's fascinating 'cause the birth rates are falling. Which ties into immigration policies. what's so interesting is, again, I go back to Europe, you've got strong anti-immigration sentiments. Fueling some parties in Germany France and the uk And what's fascinating is the Spanish example. not everyone is in favor of it, but it resonated with voters to a point where the current party's in power basically. said, look, we have two choices as Spain.

(22:49) Getting older and we're not having enough kids, so we just become an old society that can't afford social security system, or we let in immigrants, ideally younger ones. this (23:00) means, larger workforce, more children being born and the social system can continue. they've opted for route number two. Spain has a very, friendly policy. for different types of immigrants, but, it's quite open to immigration. 

(23:13) Jeremy Au: I was talking to this, person who was very much in the IVF space he was just saying like, so much of the developed world's problems, political problems, actually boils down to a Looming demographic crisis, the policy makers understand that at some level. The economics for society. Security and welfare doesn't work unless there's a component. this is now showing up as the debate between education, for all or immigration policy and the demographic side I think it was interesting because this is the real. And then everything else is a layer on top of it, which is taxation. You raise taxes, you do this or that. as a society, being people, we want people to assimilate, integrate into our society. Rather than, our society. Right. And I think that's super fair. 

(23:53) Henry: But also I come From two very multicultural societies. the Philippines is a melting pot of Malay, Chinese, Spanish (24:00) American. cultures. it makes an interesting culture. think of French culture as being very strong, but France is actually the result of influences over time. it had a lot of waves of immigration, Sometimes it was Caucasian and you don't physically notice it as much, As some of the non-Caucasian, immigrants. I'm also the product of immigration. I think immigration does solve things.

(24:19) Now the problem is, if you don't do it in a way that's, Fundamentally. then you get a lot of issues. and it's funny 'cause earlier you asked me there's anything I wanna talk about and I said politics, so I'm gonna try to not get too political here, but if you the system for the many. Then you're not fixing the problem. I think that's true with immigration. It's true with healthcare, true with housing, and it's true with education, which is why I always temper a little bit enthusiasm around ai. And I'll give you an example.

(24:45) I was just in the US a couple of weeks ago at this big conference. Fantastic. super interesting speakers, lots of folks, and there was someone there reminding me that for all this talk about AI tutors and LMSs and all these things, number one issue that some of the school districts that (25:00) she's advising is attendance. Kids are not showing up to school and if they're showing up, they haven't eaten. Or they have problems at home. And so she was like, you can throw as much AI as you want. if you have 20% of kids missing from the classroom, you're gonna need more than a piece of software to solve that.

(25:16) And I think, this is something we see over and over again in education, right? So every tool you build improve educational outcomes. Based on digital access, based on their own level of literacy, based on their level of intrinsic motivation, et cetera. but you also have to go back to how are we improving education outcome for the many, not just a few. 

(25:35) Jeremy Au: I love what you just shared I think it's a good reminder that, the sexy conversation is AI. But it is gonna take a while for it to trickle down the income pyramid I think it really goes back into society about what we need to do to invest in that. So on that note, I'd love to summarize the three big takeaways. First of all, thanks for sharing about, how you think about AI and what it means for education and whether kids will absorb AI education or not, and the different approaches people are having. Thanks for sharing how each (26:00) tutor, has been changing his business model and adapting for that future you know, thinking through why it takes for great education, teaching, and for a great experience with students. lastly, thanks for talking about, the societal aspect of it, even though we're talking about technology, there's so much that policy makers and societies need to do to really allow that, children not only, have the AI At schools and the budget we need to be thoughtful about what it means for parents to make that choice in terms of the cost of living and education needed for them to feel comfortable having kids, otherwise, the end state is gonna become so premium that, in 100 years there'll be only one child, right? We spend a trillion dollars on that one child. 

(26:37) Henry: The pressure on that child, 

(26:38) Jeremy Au: thank you so much for sharing and 

(26:39) Henry: Thanks all, Jeremy. Thank you. 

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