“Every Student Is an Asynchronous Learner”

The most revealing thing Dr. Samuel Mormando says about artificial intelligence has little to do with the technology itself.

“Start small. Start with a problem or a pain point, not a tool.”

It is an unfashionably practical answer in a field that rewards grand predictions. But Mormando, director of technology, innovation and online learning at Garnet Valley School District outside Philadelphia, has spent more than a decade working where ambitious ideas meet the ordinary limits of a school day: time, staffing, access, curriculum and the needs of an individual student.

For him, the case for AI in education is not that schools should chase every new capability. It is that carefully chosen tools can help a teacher explain a difficult math problem, introduce a unit or turn existing science resources into an accessible video for a child learning away from the classroom. The measure is not novelty. It is whether teaching and learning improve.

In a conversation with Golpo co-founder Shraman Kar, Mormando discussed how leaders can create room for experimentation without losing sight of outcomes, why asynchronous learning is more common than the label suggests and what technology companies often misunderstand about teachers.

Portraits: Garnet Valley Curriculum and Shraman Kar’s official website.

Your title includes technology and innovation. What keeps the work from becoming a job of simply managing systems and devices?

Samuel Mormando: My work goes beyond managing systems and devices. I get to work with classroom teachers and administrators nearly every day to rethink what teaching and learning can look like—in this AI era, but also with technology more broadly.

What keeps me pushing is thinking about what is possible. What can we do differently in our classrooms with these tools? I have the opportunity to learn a technology that changes almost every day, use it to become a better administrator and then help the people I serve bring those tools into the classroom. That can mean helping teachers personalize learning or analyze data so they can respond to individual students.

Many educators are curious about AI and uneasy about it at the same time. What gives you the confidence to engage early?

Mormando: I begin with my own learning. I get to learn this technology and consider how it can help me in my role. Then I can help other people use it well.

The goal is not to embrace technology simply because it is new. The opportunity is to support teachers, improve decision-making and offer students a more individualized experience. That is where the value is.

What does leadership in education look like when the ground keeps shifting?

Mormando: Leadership is less about control today than ever before. It is more about clarity and pushing what is possible.

The best leaders create the conditions in which other people can be successful—where teachers feel safe to experiment, reflect and grow in their craft. You recognize that kind of leadership when someone can say, “I don’t have all the answers yet, but we’re going to figure this out together.”

They model what learning should look like. They listen. They focus on outcomes more than optics. When everything is changing daily, leadership means guiding people through uncertainty without losing what matters most in the classroom.

In a large institution, what actually moves the needle?

Mormando: You need core values that define the role technology should play. For us, those values include purposeful use and equity. We want students and teachers to have access to current technologies, but we do not use technology for technology’s sake.

There has to be a purpose: personalizing learning, analyzing information or giving students opportunities they otherwise would not have. The biggest shift is moving from adoption as an end in itself to purposeful use.

“We don’t use technology for technology’s sake. There has to be a purpose.”

You have a striking phrase: “Every student is an asynchronous learner.” What do you mean by that?

Mormando: A student does not have to be enrolled in an online class to learn asynchronously. When the bell rings or the bus picks the student up, the teacher is no longer right there. Learning continues outside that live moment.

That is why we think about how to give students clear explanations they can return to. With Golpo, teachers can create an overview of a new unit, explain a lab activity or break down a difficult math problem. Teachers often do not have the time to script, record and edit all of those instructional videos themselves. Golpo helps them create a clear explainer and gives them time back.

Can you point to a moment when that flexibility mattered for one student?

Mormando: We had a third-grade student who needed to learn asynchronously for medical reasons. Our science curriculum was robust, but it was designed for a brick-and-mortar classroom. We did not have a digital science curriculum ready to go.

Our coaches and teachers used Golpo to work from the teaching resources, activities and learning objectives we already had. They created explanations of the lab activities so the asynchronous experience could mirror what students in the classroom were receiving as closely as possible.

Because the educators already had access to Golpo and could manage the work themselves, they were able to move quickly. The student transitioned from the traditional classroom to asynchronous learning pretty much seamlessly.

The story is modest in scale—one learner, one subject, one immediate need—and that is precisely why it matters. School technology earns its place one solved problem at a time. The full implementation story appears in our Garnet Valley customer case study.

What is hardest about aligning leaders around AI?

Mormando: Most leaders agree on the why: purposeful technology can help. The how is more complicated because every district is different.

Pacing is another challenge. The technology changes so quickly that it is difficult for any one organization to stay ahead of it. When multiple districts or leaders are trying to collaborate, differences in context and the speed of change make alignment even harder.

What advice would you give a district that is ready to begin but does not know where to start?

Mormando: Start small, and start with a problem or pain point, not a tool. Ask what is causing difficulty right now. What is taking too much time? AI may be able to help you address that and work more efficiently.

Do not begin with a broad mandate to “use AI.” Begin with a task teachers already need to do and a standard the solution must meet. That makes it possible to judge the technology by an outcome rather than by excitement.

What do people building education technology consistently miss?

Mormando: Focus less on features and more on pain points. Teachers do not need another tool. They have plenty of tools. They need a solution that clearly improves what they are trying to accomplish in the classroom.

Some vendors are always searching for the next feature or shiny object. What educators need are answers to the problems they already have: time, efficiency and the ability to do their jobs better.

“Teachers don’t need another tool. They need a solution that clearly improves what they’re trying to accomplish.”

Mormando’s argument is not a blanket endorsement of AI in schools. It is a standard for judging it. The question is not whether a product can generate something impressive. The question is whether it helps an educator make a thoughtful choice, extends access when a student cannot be in the room or returns time that can be spent on the human work of teaching.

For leaders navigating a technology cycle defined by speed, that may be the most durable strategy available: preserve the purpose, narrow the problem and let outcomes—not optics—decide what stays.