The View From the Trough
22 August 2025
Not that it matters immensely but I’ve renamed the blog section of this website. Here’s how it came about.
Earlier this week I was in Chicago to attend the summit for the AIVO AI Institute Summer Graduate Fellow Program, which my student Mariah Bradford has been participating in as one of the fellows. At the summit, I was honored to serve on a panel alongside Stephanie Teasley, Gautam Biswas, and Blair Lehman, discussing the fellows’ work over the summer and positioning within the broader AI for Education community and research landscape. During the panel, Dr. Teasley brought up the Gartner Hype cycle (see below) and asked the audience where they thought we were (or where they individually were) along the hype cycle curve.
Mariah said she was probably somewhere to the right of the Peak of Inflated Expectations, on the way down into the Trough of Disillusionment, but that I (her advisor) was in the trough. She’s right, however (as I then quipped), I’ve been in the trough since 2022 and never left. Kristy Boyer then called out from the audience that I should call my blog The View From the Trough.
So I took her suggestion. I may use this as more of a personal and position platform in addition to solely research updates.
Also iSAT got renewed. More soon.