You Said Hydraulic What????

I did mention a few days back on another platform, that I have abandoned my dreams of seeing real AI implementation at the K-12 level because innovation is as far from education as sunrise is from sunset. But upon further pondering…AI resistance is really a symptom of a much larger and pernicious problem.

For the sake of this article and other woolgathering I may do…AI resistance in education is a symptom of something I am calling ‘hydraulic calcification’. Yes, sounds fancy and not sure if there is any research that supports my supposition but hydraulic calcification is an organizational response to external pressures. The greater the force of the external pressure the greater the regressive response of the organization retreating into comfortable structures and workflows. This is a logical defensive move to protect stability and maintain homeostasis.

Remember, I am not a math person…so to be leaning on formulas is a stretch in itself. In hydraulic calcification, I see 2 variables that actually impact the tenacity of the organizational response.

Speed. Size

Speed. A new technology is adapted in the healthcare sector much quicker than say in the restaurant sector. I think in part it is the immediacy of the need of the ‘customer’ or the space between product and service. Sort of like our fast twitch and slow twitch muscle response.

Size. Walmart is big as all get up but handles and maneuvers disruptions far better than the airline industry. Sort of like how a hawk flies while a vulture soars. One handles changing winds while the other not so much.

Education as an institution is neither fast nor navigable at scale (easy to turn all at once). AI’s tension-saturated relationship with education gives an idea of what lies ahead.

If I am understanding the changes to the Department of Education at the Federal level sees services students may be receiving now fall to other Federal agencies…mind you systems that have never had to communicate before.

A scenario that occurs at any number of high schools might be a student with disabilities, who is a high school senior fulfilling a work requirement as part of their degree. Mayhaps, a situation occurs around the student’s disability…which should not have happened. What might happen currently is a school district representatives meets with the employer and hopefully, some sort of resolution is cultivated.

But I suspect this hypothetical scenario now might involve DOE, DOL, HHS & DOJ. All of sudden things get messy quick. AI was a lesson on how something disruptive was trying to get in and impacted the system. It is clear, as educators we didn’t fare well. How are we going to deal with involuntary, ambiguous systemic disruption and still be educators?

I don’t have any answers but approaching this with ‘ hydraulic calcification’ at top of mind we can approach the unknown with something from the known.

Take It To Go…

The Source: The frontline educator, watching disruption move at hummingbird speed while their institution moves at elephant speed, and feeling that gap in their own body every day.

The Pain Point: They’re not resistant to change — they’re just stuck translating fast-twitch demands into an organization built for slow-twitch response, and it’s exhausting them quietly.

The Prompt: “I work inside an organization that changes slowly, but I’m being asked to respond to something that’s moving quickly. Help me identify: (1) what parts of my actual day-to-day work I have real control over adjusting quickly, versus (2) what parts depend on the larger organization moving, which I can’t control. Then help me draft one small, realistic change I can make this week within the part I control.”

The Source: The department head or administrator who has to be the one who actually turns the elephant — who owns the unglamorous job of getting a slow, large institution to shift direction at all.

The Pain Point: They know incremental change looks like failure to people who want speed, but full-speed change breaks the institution. They need a way to defend “slow but real” without sounding like they’re just protecting the status quo.

The Prompt: “I lead a team or department inside a large, slow-moving organization, and I’m under pressure to show fast progress on a change initiative. Help me draft a short explanation, for someone impatient with the pace, of what realistic progress looks like in an organization this size — including what it would look like if we moved too fast and it broke something. Keep it concrete, not defensive.”

The Source: The parent, case manager, or advocate suddenly watching a student’s situation get pulled across multiple disconnected government systems that were never built to talk to each other.

The Pain Point: They’re not equipped to be a systems-navigator, but that’s the job now — tracking who’s responsible for what across agencies with no shared history, while a kid’s actual need sits in the middle of it.

The Prompt: “A situation I’m dealing with now involves more than one government agency or department, and I’m not sure how they coordinate with each other or who is actually responsible for what. Help me make a simple list of: (1) each agency or office involved, (2) what each one is responsible for, and (3) what questions I should ask to find out how they’re supposed to work together. I’ll fill in the specific names and details.”

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