AI ‘homework agent’ will do lazy students’ work as childhood literacy rates are in free fall

The website features a virtual version of Albert Einstein as an AI companion. According to the company, “Einstein has a full virtual computer with a browser — anything you can do, he can do.” The platform says the AI can log into the education platform Canvas on behalf of users, and once logged in, it “watches lectures, reads essays, writes papers, participates in discussions, and submits your homework — automatically.”

“Give him a reading assignment, and he reads the full text, understands it, and writes original essays with proper citations,” the company says. It also states that the AI can watch videos and extract “key concepts” using them to “answer assignments accurately.”

Companion.AI says that Einstein can go beyond traditional chatbot tools like ChatGPT by actively participating in online discussion boards, reading other students’ responses, and generating replies. The company says the tool can be used across a range of subjects, including math, physics, computer science, history, literature, and economics.

“Einstein submits assignments from your account just like you would. The work is original and generated per-assignment — not copied from a database,” the company states.

According to a report by the Associated Press, childhood literacy rates across the US are dropping rapidly. Just over 30 percent of fourth graders are considered proficient in reading. Reading proficiency has dropped 4 percent since 2019.

Despite this, in a statement to Futurism, Companion founder Advait Paliwal dismissed criticism of the technology, calling it “misplaced.”

“The education system will need to adapt to AI the same way it adapted to calculators, the internet, and Google,” he argued.