From Local Blog to Bot: How 16 Years of Sharing Citrus Schools’ Stories Became an AI Innovation at UF

More than 16 years ago, while campaigning for the Citrus County School Board, I decided to start a blog. My goal was simple: share the positive things happening in our local schools, highlight opportunities and experiences that people might not otherwise hear about, and provide information about public education in Citrus County and, occasionally, around Florida.

Over the years, Thomas Talks has become a place to tell the stories of our students, teachers, support staff, administrators, and schools. Many of those columns have also been published in the Citrus County Chronicle, extending their reach throughout our community. Together, these more than 500 columns have provided an opportunity to highlight the accomplishments, opportunities, and challenges facing public education while helping readers better understand the decisions that shape our schools. I never imagined this collection of writing would one day help train an artificial intelligence model at the University of Florida.

That unexpected development is now known as School Board “Tom Bot.”

From a Blog to a Virtual School Board Partner

Dr. Robert Winsler, a professor at the University of Florida’s Warrington College of Business, developed Tom Bot as a proof of concept with my permission. The project explores how years of an individual’s published writing, experiences, opinions, advocacy, and biographical information can be used to create a virtual representation of that person.

The model draws on my years of writing about education, school governance, public policy, and community engagement, along with experiences serving on the Citrus County School Board and participating in statewide education initiatives. It resides on UF’s HiPerGator supercomputer, where Dr. Winsler and his students have been exploring its potential in a learning environment.

Dr. Winsler explained what made the project particularly meaningful for his class:

“The class I use Tom Bot in is called Positive Business Communication, so Mr. Kennedy was a natural fit. The students have to interview someone who they consider to be a positive business communicator role model, and Mr. Kennedy is my positive communicator role model, so I was thrilled when he agreed to participate. The chat bot helps the students practice their questions before conducting the real thing with a business professional who has limited time to talk.”

The project shows how years of information can become a learning resource and help preserve institutional knowledge, support professional development, and explore complex issues.

Why the Experience Behind the Information Matters

The University of Florida’s CS Everyone Center for Computer Science Education, led by Dr. Maya Israel, is helping advance conversations about how computer science and emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can support teaching, learning, and educational opportunity.

Dr. Israel sees particular value in the depth of experience and real-world context represented in Thomas Talks. As she explained:

“Tom Bot captures the nuance of Thomas Talks, which reflects how someone with deep expertise in school governance has worked through real decisions in real communities for many years. That makes it a valuable resource for both teaching and research.”

She is interested in exploring how similar approaches might help a new teacher try an instructional strategy, allow a student to learn from a professional in a field they are considering, or help a school leader prepare for a difficult conversation.

“As a researcher, I am excited to explore how tools like this can support meaningful learning for educators, students, and the people who lead our schools,” she added.

These possibilities matter as educators consider how technology can support students with different learning needs. AI’s value should be measured by whether it helps people learn, solve problems, and make better-informed decisions.

Preserving Experience for Future Leaders

Andrea Messina, chief executive officer of the Florida School Boards Association, brings an important statewide perspective to this conversation. Florida’s term limits for school board members create a unique challenge: preserving the experience, knowledge, and lessons learned by elected officials so future board members can benefit from them.

Every Florida district has its own story, but many of the governance challenges facing school board members are shared. Messina sees potential for tools like Tom Bot to make the insights and experiences of current and former board members more accessible, supporting professional development and helping future leaders think through difficult issues before facing them firsthand.

She also emphasizes that responsible AI implementation requires clear expectations for ownership of source material, accuracy, and privacy. These tools should complement human judgment and accountability, never replace them.

As she put it:

“Florida’s eight-year term limits make preserving experienced school board members’ lessons for the next generation especially important. Those lessons should not leave office with them. The value of something like Tom Bot should not be in simply sounding like Thomas, but in helping others think more deeply and lead more effectively.”

That distinction is important. The opportunity is not simply to recreate someone’s voice or personality. It is to preserve years of experience and make that knowledge available to others as they develop their own judgment and leadership.

Looking Beyond the Bot

As co-chair of the Florida School Boards Association’s AI in Education and Emerging Technology Committee and a founding member of Florida’s K-12 AI Task Force, I have spent considerable time exploring the opportunities and challenges these technologies present.

The question is no longer whether AI will influence education and the workforce. It is how we use it responsibly to improve opportunities for students and educators.

AI tools can personalize learning, provide practice, support English language learners, and offer alternative explanations. They can also help students explore careers, develop digital literacy, and prepare for a workforce where AI will be part of everyday work.

More advanced agentic AI systems may eventually take on complex, multistep tasks. That makes it even more important that students develop critical thinking, problem-solving skills, and the ability to evaluate information rather than simply accept what a technology produces.

Technology should strengthen human relationships, not replace them. Responsible implementation must include attention to privacy, accuracy, fairness, and trust.

Those considerations were important to my participation in the Tom Bot project. The University of Florida’s agreement with the AI companies involved includes protections intended to prevent the model from being used to train publicly available AI models. That added privacy protection was an important consideration in making this otherwise very personal experiment possible.

An Unexpected Chapter in the Journey

I am grateful to Dr. Winsler, Dr. Israel, Andrea Messina, and the faculty, researchers, and students who have helped make this project possible. I never imagined that writing about our schools for more than 16 years would contribute to AI research at one of Florida’s leading universities.

When I started Thomas Talks, I simply wanted to share stories, provide information, and help people better understand the good things happening in our public schools. That purpose has not changed.

If this unexpected chapter helps researchers explore how technology can preserve experience, support learning, and expand opportunities for future educators and school leaders, then those years of writing have taken me somewhere I never anticipated. And that is a pretty remarkable extension of the original idea.

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Taking a Bite Out of Entrepreneurship: High School Students Enter the Shark Tank

Sometimes the best way to learn about economics is to stop reading about it and start running a business.

If you walked into an economics classroom at Crystal River High School recently, you might have wondered whether you had taken a wrong turn and ended up on the set of ABC’s popular television show Shark Tank. There were entrepreneurs, business plans, product demonstrations, investment pitches, financial projections, and plenty of tough questions from prospective investors.

But this wasn’t television. It was learning in action, and the students were the stars.

Economics teacher Peter Rausch, affectionately known around campus as “Coach,” who also serves as the school’s offensive coordinator, took a creative approach to teaching entrepreneurship. Rather than simply asking students to read about supply and demand, marketing, and profitability, he challenged them to put those concepts into practice.

He transformed his classroom into an entrepreneurial zone, giving students the opportunity to become product designers, marketers, and prospective company CEOs.

The purpose of the CRHS “On the River” Shark Tank Business Challenge was to help students better understand entrepreneurship by experiencing what it takes to create and present a business.

Working in teams, students developed products or services, identified potential customers, researched manufacturing options, and considered startup expenses, pricing, marketing, profit and loss projections, and company goals. They even had to consider intellectual property, patents, and legal questions.

In other words, they had to think critically beyond whether someone might like their idea. They had to explain whether it could become a viable business.

The first investment round introduced another dimension. Students submitted promotional pitches to teacher investors, each of whom received $1 million in imaginary investment dollars to distribute among the competing companies in $100,000 increments.

The preliminary results were impressive. Based on 47 investor responses, 12 student businesses attracted a combined $27.6 million in mock investments. Eight businesses ultimately appeared in the final results.

Among the creative concepts were A.C.S., or Anti-Cheating Screen, a proposed screen protector designed to make photographing digital assessments with an external smartphone more difficult; Spring Guard, later identified as Springs Gear, featuring solar-powered vending kiosks offering sunscreen, sunglasses, and other outdoor essentials at waterfront destinations; and All in All Mowers, proposing autonomous commercial landscaping equipment designed to reduce labor requirements.

Other businesses included Polar Grips, adjustable heated gloves; KeyVault, a biometric USB storage device; Fashion Wardrobe, an automated closet system; Swiss-Smile, a portable dental hygiene product; and Skinly, a skincare and cosmetics concept. Students also developed jewelry, portable lighting, charging devices, driver-safety applications, and other products.

Each team had a different idea, target market, and set of challenges to overcome.

Then came the main event: the live Shark Tank presentations.

I had the opportunity to participate as one of four Sharks, alongside Superintendent Dr. Scott Hebert, Deputy Superintendent Laura Lindeman, and Crystal River High School Principal Phill McLeod. Each Shark received $3 million in imaginary investment dollars to allocate among the competing businesses.

Let me tell you, these students came prepared.

Their presentations were exceptionally organized and demonstrated a real understanding of their products and proposed businesses. More importantly, when the Sharks began asking questions, the students didn’t simply recite memorized talking points or become overwhelmed by the scrutiny.

They answered.

We asked about manufacturing costs, pricing, competition, potential customers, profitability, and the challenges of bringing their ideas to market. Time after time, students responded with conviction, demonstrated an understanding of their business models, and defended their ideas.

That is where the real educational value became especially evident. It is one thing to complete a worksheet explaining profit and loss. It is quite another to stand before a group of adults, defend your pricing strategy, explain your financial assumptions, and respond when someone challenges your business model.

The final investment results reflected the students’ efforts. A.C.S. finished with $8.4 million in combined initial and Shark investments, narrowly ahead of All in All Mowers at $8.35 million. KeyVault and Polar Grips each finished with $5.1 million, while Springs Gear attracted $4.7 million. Jewels by Mady & Dee finished with $1.5 million, Swiss-Smile with $1.3 million, and Skinly with $1.1 million.

Not every business received an additional Shark investment, but that was part of the experience, too. In the real world, not every entrepreneur secures the investment they seek. Learning to evaluate feedback, reconsider an approach, and continue developing an idea is just as important as celebrating success.

Coach Rausch summed up the purpose of the experience beautifully:

“CRHS ‘On the River’ Shark Tank is more than an Economics project; it gives our students a chance to apply what they have learned in the classroom to real-world situations while building confidence, creativity, critical thinking, and entrepreneurial skills.”

He also expressed his appreciation to Superintendent Hebert, Deputy Superintendent Lindeman, Principal McLeod, and me for taking time out of our respective schedules to participate. As Coach pointed out, the investment went well beyond the mock dollars. It was about investing our time, experience, encouragement, and genuine interest in the students and their ideas.

Perhaps his most meaningful observation was about where the greatest investment truly belongs: in our students.

As Rausch put it, “They are not just the leaders of tomorrow; they are the innovators of today. I am honored and privileged to be an educator at CRHS.”

I think that says it all.

As one of the Sharks, I walked into Crystal River High School expecting to participate in an interesting economics lesson. I walked away with something more: an even deeper appreciation for the abilities, creativity, confidence, and potential of our students.

I also gained an appreciation for Coach Rausch and the thought behind this experience. Teachers make a tremendous difference when they connect classroom learning with the decisions and challenges students will encounter beyond graduation.

Whether these students become business owners, engineers, educators, healthcare professionals, or pursue entirely different careers, the ability to identify a problem, develop a solution, communicate an idea, understand financial considerations, and confidently defend a decision will serve them well.

Our students weren’t simply learning about economics. They were practicing it.

Congratulations to Coach Rausch and the students of Crystal River High School. Sometimes the best classroom lessons happen when students are given the opportunity to take center stage.

I can tell you, the Sharks learned a little something, too!

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Expanding Agriculture: Showing Students That Agriculture Is More Than Farming

When most people hear the word agriculture, they probably picture a farmer, a tractor, cattle, crops or a field stretching toward the horizon.

But if you had been at the College of Central Florida on Friday, September 18, you would have seen a very different picture of agriculture.

You would have seen drones, technology, electricity, science, business, skilled trades, animals, environmental systems, equipment, education and, increasingly, artificial intelligence.

You would have seen the future.

Approximately 150 area high school agricultural students participated in the third annual Expanding Agriculture: Workforce program hosted by UF/IFAS Extension Citrus County at the College of Central Florida. The hands-on event introduced students to the tremendous variety of careers available throughout agriculture and helped them connect their interests and talents to real workforce opportunities.

Agriculture is not simply about what happens on a farm. It is an enormous ecosystem requiring people with many different skills.

The event opened with Dr. Marnie Ward, who leads the Citrus County UF/IFAS Extension Center and has served as an Extension Agent in Citrus County for 13 years. Her passion for agriculture and creating opportunities for young people was evident throughout the day.

The featured speaker was Dr. Saqib Mukhtar, Associate Dean and Assistant Director for Extension at the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, or UF/IFAS. He challenged students to think much more broadly about what an agricultural career can look like.

Florida is a year-round agriculture and aquaculture state, and agriculture touches every county. UF/IFAS information presented to students noted approximately 44,400 farm operations covering 9.7 million acres, with growers and fishers producing between 200 and 300 different commodities.

But the numbers demonstrating how far agriculture reaches beyond production are even more impressive.

When multiplier effects are considered, Florida’s agricultural and food system supports approximately $387.4 billion in sales revenue and nearly 2.5 million jobs throughout Florida’s economy. Agriculture is one of Florida’s largest industries, second only to tourism.

That is not simply a farming industry. That is a workforce ecosystem.

Nationally, USDA projections presented at the event estimate approximately 104,766 annual job openings from 2025 through 2030 for college and career graduates in food, agriculture, renewable natural resources and the environment.

The breakdown tells an important story. Forty-one percent of those projected openings are in business and management, 21 percent in science and engineering, 19 percent in food and biomaterials production, and another 19 percent in education, communication and governmental services.

Agriculture needs accountants, managers, engineers, scientists, educators, technicians, mechanics, entrepreneurs and technology specialists.

One of the best examples we saw Friday came from a conversation with Clint Jackson, manager of system reliability for Withlacoochee River Electric Cooperative.

WREC was one of the organizations helping students understand workforce opportunities connected to agriculture and rural infrastructure, including its lineworker program.

Clint explained how WREC uses sophisticated drone technology to inspect electrical lines. These drones can fly along the lines and help identify potential problems, allowing workers to determine where repairs or replacements may be needed and helping maintain system reliability.

Even more interesting is what happens after the technology identifies an issue. Automation and artificial intelligence can assist workers in analyzing information and determining what needs attention.

Think about that for a moment.

A student interested in agriculture might discover a career involving electricity, line work, drones, data, automation and artificial intelligence.

That student may never spend their career driving a tractor, but they can still be an important part of the agricultural workforce.

That is why events like Expanding Agriculture are so valuable.

Students explored opportunities with more than 20 organizations and educational programs, including UF/IFAS Extension, College of Central Florida, Withlacoochee River Electric Cooperative, the UF College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, Workforce Technical Center, the Florida Forest Service, Mosquito Control, Ag-Pro, Riverbend Cattle, Bill’s Bees and several other businesses, agencies and agricultural organizations.

They could learn about mechanics, welding, drones, plants, animals, business management, forestry, environmental systems, equine careers and emerging technologies.

Florida State Representative J.J. Grow, a UF/IFAS alumnus, was also there supporting the students.

What struck us most was how well this event connects to the broader conversation about career and technical education and the future of work.

There is sometimes a false choice presented between college and skilled trades. We have never believed that is the right way to look at it.

Students need pathways.

Some will go directly into the workforce. Some will attend a technical college. Some will attend a four-year university. Others will pursue advanced degrees. Many will combine several of those pathways throughout their careers.

Agriculture demonstrates why we need all of them.

The UF/IFAS Agriculture Extension Initiative encompasses animal and forage systems, plant systems, food systems and integrated systems. Those integrated systems increasingly include farm economics, technology, precision agriculture and artificial intelligence.

The technology is changing, but the need for talented people is not.

Artificial intelligence is not something that belongs only in a technology classroom or computer science department. It is becoming part of how we grow food, manage natural resources, inspect infrastructure, operate equipment, analyze data and make businesses more efficient.

The student who loves animals may have a future in veterinary science or equine management. The student who loves working with their hands may become a technician, welder, mechanic or lineworker. The student who loves computers may find a career in agricultural technology, drones, automation or AI. The student who loves business may work in finance, logistics, marketing or agricultural management.

There is a place for every talent.

A workforce pipeline does not begin when a student graduates. It begins when a young person encounters an opportunity and realizes, perhaps for the first time, I could do that.

That happened for 150 students at CF on Friday.

We are grateful to UF/IFAS and our local Extension professionals for investing in our students and to the College of Central Florida for opening their campus for this outstanding event.

We also want to recognize and thank the high school agriculture teachers who brought their students, supported their participation and helped make the day possible. Their work does not begin or end with an event like this. Every day, these teachers introduce students to agriculture, develop their skills, connect classroom learning to real-world opportunities and help young people see possibilities for their future. Their support is an important part of building the agricultural workforce our communities and state will need.

We also appreciate the community partners who contributed their time, expertise and resources, including M & B Dairy, which provided milk, yogurt and smoothies; Farm Credit of Central Florida, which provided lunch; and Mike Scott Plumbing, which provided water.

Those contributions represent more than a successful event. They represent a community investing in its future.

Perhaps the most important lesson from Expanding Agriculture is this:

Agriculture is not just about producing what we need today. It is about developing the people, skills and technology we will need tomorrow.

Our students deserve to see that future.

More importantly, they deserve the opportunity to be part of it.

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