Reading was a big deal when I was a kid, but it was also a challenge. I’m dyslexic, dysgraphic, and dysnumeric, which made traditional learning methods difficult—but that’s largely another story. My parents—determined, if not always gentle—had a simple solution: they forced me to read, interpret, and present. They assigned me books, and I had to give oral reports on them. In hindsight, it was one of the most impactful things they did for me because that process—taking in complex information, distilling it, and presenting it clearly—is exactly how professionals in technology function today.

One of the books they had me read was Plato’s Republic. My biggest takeaway? How little had changed in our fundamental struggles with governance. The same debates about justice, power, and human nature that played out in ancient Greece continue today—only the terminology and tools have changed. Looking back, it makes sense why my parents chose that book. My father is logical to a fault and deeply patriotic, and my mother, though no longer politically active, still carries a pocket Constitution in her purse, with more in her trunk in case she runs out. Law and governance weren’t abstract to me—they were everyday conversations.

That experience stayed with me. It made me realize that governance isn’t just about laws—it’s about whether people understand and engage with those laws. And today, we face a different challenge: not a lack of information, but an overwhelming amount of it.

We tend to think of education—whether in civics, history, or technology—as a process of absorbing facts. But facts alone aren’t useful if we don’t know how to assess, connect, or apply them. When I was a kid, I didn’t just have to read The Republic—I had to present it, explain it, and engage with it. That distinction is important. Simply memorizing a passage from Plato wouldn’t have taught me much, but thinking through what it meant, arguing about its implications, and framing it in a way that made sense to me? That was where the real learning happened.

The same principle applies today. We live in an era where access to knowledge is not the bottleneck. AI can summarize court rulings, analyze laws, and map out how different governance systems compare. Information is endless, but comprehension is scarce. The problem isn’t finding knowledge—it’s knowing what matters, how to think critically about it, and how to engage with it.

This issue isn’t unique to civic engagement. It’s the same challenge students face as AI reshapes how they learn. It’s no longer enough to teach kids historical dates, formulas, or legal principles. They need to know how to question sources, evaluate reliability, and synthesize information in meaningful ways. They need to be prepared for a world where facts are easy to retrieve, but judgment, reasoning, and application are the real skills that matter.

The challenge for civic engagement is similar. There’s no shortage of legislative updates, executive orders, or judicial decisions to sift through. What’s missing is a way to contextualize them—to understand where they fit within constitutional principles, how they compare globally, and what their broader implications are.

That’s why the opportunity today is so compelling. The same AI-driven shifts transforming education can change how people engage with governance. Imagine a world where AI doesn’t just regurgitate legal language but helps people grasp how laws have evolved over time. Where it doesn’t just list amendments but connects them to historical debates and real-world consequences. Where it helps individuals—not just legal experts—track how their representatives vote, how policies change, and how different governance models approach similar challenges.

When I was growing up, my parents didn’t just want me to know about Plato’s ideas; they wanted me to engage with them. To question them. To challenge them. That’s what civic engagement should be—not passive consumption of legal information, but active participation in governance. And just as students today need to shift from memorization to deeper understanding, citizens need to move from surface-level awareness to critical, informed engagement with the world around them.

In many ways, AI could serve a similar role to what my parents did for me—forcing engagement, breaking down complexity, and pushing us to think critically. The difference is, this time, we have the tools to make that experience accessible to everyone.

Plato questioned whether democracy could survive without a well-informed citizenry. Today, the challenge isn’t lack of information—it’s making that information usable. And with the right approach, we can turn civic engagement from a passive duty into an active, lifelong pursuit.