The Complementary Roles of Human Connection and AI Personalization
Max BigmanCampus (campus.edu) · 🇺🇸 United States
What if AI personalization and human connection could reinforce each other instead of competing? The NCTE 2026 opening keynote explores the design patterns that make that possible — and what they mean for how we teach.
The Complementary Roles of Human Connection and AI Personalization
About the session
NCTE 2026 opens with a combined ceremony and plenary: official welcome by CCCN and U.S. Embassy authorities, followed immediately by the inaugural keynote.
The dominant narrative around AI in education frames it as a replacement — AI tutors, AI graders, AI assistants. But the most powerful design space is one where AI personalization and human connection reinforce each other instead of competing. Drawing on his Stanford dissertation and his current work building AI-native learning experiences at Campus, Max will share two complementary design patterns: AI that surfaces what humans should pay attention to rather than acting on their behalf, and AI that scales the most relational parts of teaching — helping instructors give individual attention and build real connections with students at class sizes where that would otherwise be impossible.
What you'll take away
- A framework for evaluating when AI substitutes vs. strengthens human connection.
- Design patterns for AI that amplifies — rather than replaces — the teacher's relational role.
- Practical examples from AI-native learning environments deployed at scale.
