I was contacted by Gina at Education Week as they were planning a Special Report on AI. A cover and interior illustrations were needed. The report was looking at the big questions now raised for schools on how to evaluate and respond to the proliferation of AI. How to determine what role AI should play in education, how to develop a better understanding of the benefits and drawbacks of the technology, and then to leverage it to improve teaching and learning and the management of schools.
To help schools reach those goals, a number of aspects were examined from teacher training to deepfakes, assessment and special needs. The tone of the reporting was to be focused on solutions, so positive, hopeful imagery was requested.
Accordingly, for the cover I loved the idea of using a digitised butterfly. It works both as a symbol for transformation but also relates to the ‘butterfly effect’ idea and how everything is deeply interconnected.
Ideas for the interior illustrations sprang from the texts. Here are some of the published pages and proposed concept drawings.