Sam DeReign

AI Academy

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About the Event

AI Academy was created to meet a growing need we kept hearing from faculty—how do we navigate AI in the classroom?

In Fall ’23, we launched our first cohort, and it filled up almost immediately with 350 participants. The demand was so high, we opened two more cohorts in 2024 to make sure everyone could take part.

This is an online, self-paced course, but it’s anything but passive. AI Academy is all about collaboration and community. Participants are encouraged to dive into discussions, share resources, and brainstorm together. Each week includes guest presentations, hands-on activities, and community hours where educators exchange ideas and help each other put what they’ve learned into practice.

By the end of the course, participants complete a final project to earn CEUs and a professional certification in Teaching with AI.

My Role

• Developed the go-to-market content strategy for AI Academy, in partnership with our Lead Events Manager and Vice President of Academics.
• Collaborated cross-functionally with marketing and brand teams to align content and visuals with the program’s goals and audience.
• Produced a comprehensive social media calendar, creating content to generate awareness and engagement leading up to and throughout the course.
• Provided creative direction to our video vendor, ensuring the video materials resonated with the course’s collaborative and community-driven ethos.
• Curated and distributed weekly resources from our faculty knowledge hub, tailoring content to match each week’s topic and enhance participants’ learning experience.

Sam has successfully executed the responsibilities of his own role and much more. He is deeply committed to Course Hero and is a rare gem that always goes above and beyond to find answers, source intel, improve skills, share ideas, collaborate, and support.

Sam’s impact is significant. Without him, we wouldn’t have a person managing content strategy across all educator touchpoints in marketing, brand, product. He has developed subject matter expertise that really no one else has here.

Niamh Hughes, VP Communications at Course Hero

Emails

When crafting the email campaign for AI Academy, we made it a priority to speak directly to faculty concerns about AI. We wanted to show teachers how they could help students engage with AI in ways that actually boost critical thinking and classroom engagement. But just as importantly, we aimed to make everyone feel welcome—whether they were AI beginners or more experienced.

We acknowledged how busy educators are, so we emphasized the course’s flexibility, while also highlighting its interactive, community-based elements. This approach resonated with our audience, leading to consistently high open rates of 28–30% and filling all cohorts.