AI Elevates Peer Discussion and Keeps Students On-Topic

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Janak Panchal and Rishan Dutia are cofounders of CoGuide, an AI classroom assistant that plans lessons and runs live discussions in 30+ languages. Janak, a former assistant guide with 250+ socratic discussions sessions within the Acton Academy Network, built the first MVP. Rishan leads engineering and builds the Vision OS for hand-raising and participation analytics.

💡 5 Things You’ll Learn in This Episode:

1. How a teacherpreneur and a student founder teamed up to build CoGuide
2. Why AI facilitation goes beyond lesson planning to live classroom discussions
3. How Vision OS tracks participation and supports teachers with actionable data
4. The balance between teacher augmentation and student privacy
5. Where Janak and Rishan see AI in classrooms heading in the next three years

✨ Episode Highlights:
[00:02:12] Janak Panchal on turning classroom struggles into CoGuide’s first MVP
[00:04:18] Rishan Dutia on becoming one of the youngest edtech founders at 12
[00:05:55] How CoGuide evolved into Vision OS with live classroom facilitation
[00:09:51] Janak explains “standby mode” and real-time analytics for teachers
[00:11:17] Rishan on building privacy-first AI that works in 30+ languages
[00:16:03] Why CoGuide focuses on collaboration, not one-on-one AI tutoring
[00:27:39] Janak shares how CoGuide could reduce teacher burnout
[00:29:04] Rishan on augmenting, not automating, the teacher’s role

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🎉 Presenting Sponsor/s:

This season of Edtech Insiders is once again brought to you by Tuck Advisors, the M&A firm for EdTech companies. Run by serial entrepreneurs with over 30 years of experience founding, investing in, and selling companies, Tuck believes you deserve M&A advisors who work as hard as you do.

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