Interesting article. I wonder how much of the problems with either LMS or AI usage are to be ultimately pinned on the faculty themselves. The article does say that too many of the faculty "like the convenience and like being able to phone it in". Canvas simply constructs the exact destructive incentive that exacerbates this tendency: as the article says, Canvas is ultimately a compliance and accreditation tool, not a learning tool, and so it makes accreditation easier and easier, while the learning part is still left to the teachers. Is it not that Canvas simply does what it is supposed to do? Is it not that it is on the educational institutions to ensure real standards of quality? Instructure Inc. is not the one that overprioritizes accreditation at the expense of learning.

That said, I see potential in the idea that this separation of "accreditation" and "learning" is exactly the problem.

The author has linked two other blog posts to this one (the ones linked in "bad teaching" and "ridiculous standards") that, in my opinion, target the core of the issue better. I'm not sure if Canvas is really at the heart of these problems, as the article asserts, or if it, just like AI, is exposing harmful societal incentives that we have been living with for ages.

There's a comment under the article that basically shows what I'm saying. It's possible for a teacher to have an easier time teaching with Canvas, while not sacrificing the critical human aspect of learning. I do concur that it is simply a lot harder to do this now.