Delegate, Direct, or Do · Creative & Media
Journalist: what would you hand to AI?
Transcription and summaries are cheap; verifying a source, and a photo, is the craft.
AI changes a lot of this job
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Three bins
| Delegate | AI does it and a person spot-checks the result. |
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| Direct | AI drafts; a person steers, fixes, and decides. |
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| Do | A person does it. AI stays out. |
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Four questions for every task
Every sort needs a one-line reason that uses at least one of these.
- What does a mistake cost? A typo in a draft is cheap. A wrong dose, a wrong verdict, or a live wire is not.
- Can a person check the output quickly? If checking takes as long as doing it, delegating saves nothing.
- Who answers for the result? Whoever signs, submits, or says it out loud owns it, whoever wrote the draft.
- Does it involve private data or judging people? Health records, student files, and decisions about a person need a person.
Grades 6-8: Sort it
Start with these tasks, then add 3-7 more that people in this job really do. Put each in a bin and write one line on why, using the four questions.
- Transcribe a recorded interview
- Draft three possible headlines for a story
- Confirm with a second source that a quote is real
Some jobs land mostly in Do. That is a real answer, not a failure.
Grades 9-12: Brief it, then audit it
Sort the tasks as above. Then pick one Delegate or Direct task and write a brief with four parts: the goal, the context the AI needs, the constraints it must follow, and what done looks like.
Audit this sample
Write a news brief from a city council meeting
- goal
- A four-sentence news brief on tonight's bus-route vote.
- context
- The council voted 5-2 to move the Route 9 bus off Elm Street starting in March. Councilmember Ortiz voted no and said, "Riders on the east side were never asked." The mayor said the change saves about 8 minutes per trip.
- constraints
- Only facts and quotes from the context. Name who said each quote.
- done
- Four sentences, every fact and quote matching the context.
What the AI sent back
The city council voted unanimously Tuesday to move the Route 9 bus off Elm Street starting in March.
The mayor said the change will save riders about 8 minutes per trip.
Councilmember Ortiz said, "Riders on the east side were never asked."
The new route takes effect in March.
Something here should stop you from signing off. Find it, name which of the four questions it fails, and rewrite the brief so it is less likely to happen again.
A live AI tool is optional, only if your district allows student use.
Close: one task you would never hand off
Which task would you never hand off in this job, and why?
Grades 6-8: one paragraph. Grades 9-12: a short argued response that answers the strongest reason someone might give for handing it off.