Foundations
Most people use a fraction of what AI tools can do because nobody showed them the levers. Foundations moves you from one-off chats to systems that support your work every day.
We teach practical application. Not what dazzles in a demo but what you will actually apply day in and day out to your work.
We build conceptual understanding. If you grasp the why, then you can deploy the how more flexibly & confidently.
You'll leave with working systems — Projects, instructions, and Skills built on your own work — not a folder of prompts you'll never open again.
Writing Partner
Sharpen your writing without losing your voice.
AI isn’t a magic typewriter, but it can be a powerful ally throughout the writing process. This session teaches strategies for collaborating effectively across the writing spectrum, from lower stakes tasks where speed matters to higher stakes ones where voice is everything.
Assignment: Write or revise something real using the strategies from class.
Context Partner
Use Projects to support your daily work, personal or professional.
Projects can turn AI into a personal operating system. Learn to layer knowledge, project instructions, and prompting to create high-leverage workflows for tasks like writing, networking, and planning (whether your week or your meals).
Assignment: Build two Projects that assist your actual workflows.
Persistent Partner
Protect your privacy while getting AI to remember what matters to your work.
Getting AI to forget & getting AI to remember are two sides of the same coin. In this session, we discuss privacy and what you can do to ensure yours. We also introduce Instructions & Skills as ways of getting AI to remember what’s useful to you. AI becomes far more powerful when it knows your goals, adapts to your preferred work style, and produces output the way you like.
Assignment: Set up your user instructions and one Skill that's valuable to your work.
Knowledge Partner
Collaborate with AI to find, understand, and use information.
How AI accesses knowledge determines the accuracy of what it gives back. Learn to audit how it works, choose the right model for the job, and reach beyond training data with connectors and Deep Research.
Assignment: Compare two models on one task; run a Deep Research task that matters to your work; set up connectors.
Analytic Partner
Make sense of structured information.
Spreadsheet-based AI can structure and interpret both quantitative and qualitative information. Learn to partner with AI to get to deeper, auditable insights faster.
See it
Every concept is worked through live, on real examples. Everyone gets the recording for 7 days.
Try it
You apply what you learned to your work, ~30 minutes outside class.
Get feedback
You email your work to your instructor, who reviews it and adds notes where helpful.
Build on it
The next class opens with a discussion of examples & questions from the submissions.
Education & schools
- Alexandria City Public Schools
- Excel Academy
- KIPP Foundation
- School Empowerment Network
- Teach For America
- Transcend
- Wildflower Schools
Philanthropy
- Arnold Ventures
- The Broad Foundation
- Carnegie Foundation
- Milton & Carroll Petrie Foundation
- Raikes Foundation
- Scarlett Family Foundation
- Wellspring Philanthropic Fund
Business & investing
- B Capital
- Constellation Energy
- Hustle Fund
- MM.LaFleur
- Resilience VC
- Saison Capital
- Thumbtack
Plus dozens of independent consultants and boutique advisory firms.
How much background do you expect people to have?
This class is the right fit for people who want to master chat-based AI. Some people start from no/low background & some start from daily professional use.
Am I too advanced for this training?
If you can already do all of these things fluently, you may be looking for something more advanced:
- Use Projects as lightweight operating systems
- Select the appropriate model for the task
- Set up Skills
If you have questions about fit, please feel free to contact us or check out our more advanced courses, Skills & Surfaces and Cowork.
What tools will you use?
The Foundation series centers features that are common across Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini. We will primarily demo from a Claude account but are prepared to answer questions about any of these three AIs.
We no longer specifically support Copilot because it's not a tool we use day-to-day.
Do I really need a paid account?
The easiest level up available in AI is to pay for your account, whether it's with ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini. Which AI you choose matters less than whether you're using a free account vs a paid one.
I can't make the listed sessions but would like to join for a future one. Do you have a list I can join?
If you add your email address here, we'll notify you when we open future trainings.
What if I have to miss a class?
Whether you make it to class or not, we'll send you a recording of the training for personal use that is good for seven days so you can catch up before the next class.
What is your refund policy?
Unfortunately, once you're registered, we aren't able to offer refunds but can issue a credit that you can use to enroll in a future course.
Ready to build your foundations?
Enroll — next cohort Aug 21