This story about intelligence testing in schools was produced by the Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Even before her son started kindergarten, Ashley Meier Barlow realized that she might have to fight for his education. Her son has Down syndrome; when he was in prekindergarten, school officials in Fort Thomas, Kentucky, told Barlow that he wouldn't be going to the neighborhood school, with some special education accommodations, as she had assumed. Instead, the educators told Barlow that they wanted her son to attend a classroom across town meant for children who are profoundly impacted by their disabilities. Barlow immediately resisted because she knew the curriculum would likely focus on life skills, and her son might never be taught much reading beyond learning the shape of common, functional words like stop and exit.

Students newly accepted by colleges and universities this spring are being deluged by emails and texts in the hope that they will put down their deposits and enroll. If they have questions about deadlines, financial aid, and even where to eat on campus, they can get instant answers. The messages are friendly and informative. Artificial intelligence, or AI, is being used to shoot off these seemingly personal appeals and deliver pre-written information through chatbots and text personas meant to mimic human banter. It can help a university or college by boosting early deposit rates while cutting down on expensive and time-consuming calls to stretched admissions staffs.

For all the talk about how artificial intelligence could transform what happens in the classroom, AI hasn't yet lived up to the hype. AI involves creating computer systems that can perform tasks that typically require human intelligence. It's already being experimented with to help automate grading, tailor lessons to students' individual needs and assist English language learners. We heard about a few promising ideas at a conference I attended last week on artificial intelligence hosted by Teachers College, Columbia University. Shipeng Li, corporate vice president of iFLYTEK, talked about how the Chinese company is working to increase teachers' efficiency by individualizing homework assignments.

Yes, the robots are definitely coming for the jobs of America's 3.5 million cashiers. Just ask the retail workers who've already been displaced by automated checkout machines. Robots may also be coming for radiologists, whose expertise diagnosing diseases through X-rays and MRIs is facing stiff competition from artificial intelligence. And robots are starting to do some of the work in professions as diverse as chef, office clerk and tractor-trailer operator. For most of us, though, the robot invasion will simply change the tasks we do, not destroy our jobs altogether.

Scientists are using artificial intelligence to build systems that can analyze the quality of classroom instruction and student engagement. School leaders and education researchers often rely on test scores to judge how well students are learning. But that ignores many important aspects of learning, such as the liveliness of classroom discussion or how engaged and motivated the students are. Expert observers in a classroom can immediately pick up on these unquantifiable moments of great teaching. But human observations are time-consuming and expensive.