Artificial intelligence has proven that it can scour the internet for information quickly to answer questions. But teaching students using AI is a difficult task. The stakes are even higher when the goal is not just to study in school, but to do well on high-stakes tests like the SAT and ACT.
On the face of it, education may seem like a natural extension of big language models. If AI can replace customer support, it can certainly provide feedback just like a teacher can.
But schooling is not for consumers. Teachers and school administrators don’t want chatbots. Chatbots can make mistakes, chatbots make mistakes. But if you’re giving student instruction to a chatbot, you can hinder student progress for months. Teachers need the tools they use to protect characters, be safe, be accountable, and be consistent.
That’s why the creators of Smartschool, a Palo Alto-based education technology company, decided to build their platform by starting with the problems students and teachers face. Rather than modifying existing AI tools, invest in building an AI tutor designed to help students truly learn and work under pressure. That gap between a smart chatbot and a tool teachers can actually trust is what Smartschool plans to bridge, with the SAT and ACT among the key tests it supports.
In a way, they were well prepared for this task. Smartschool was founded by three Polish entrepreneurs – Mat Masłowski, Paul Burzyński, and Kajetan Lewandowski. The trio had experience working for various technology firms and a strong academic background. They also grew up in Poland facing difficult economic changes, where opportunities were limited and access to quality education was far from guaranteed.
“Coming from relatively poor backgrounds, we wanted to be able to help people get higher education and make it possible to have similar stories, as long as they want to take action,” commented Maslowski, CEO of Smartschool.Because if we keep the current education system as it is, when the whole world is changing so fast, we will have a very unfair and unequal society in the future.,” he says.
Challenges of AI-based learning
A key observation of the Smartschool team was that conventional AI systems were not built for classroom realities. This is especially true in math education, as large language varieties are notoriously tricky. They may jump ahead, skip steps, and reward wrong answers. These kinds of technical mistakes can cause real problems for teachers and students, and are certainly partly responsible for the current skepticism about AI.
AI also cannot be one-size-fits-all in a teaching environment. An effective platform needs to be customized, to align with the curriculum and national standards, not to mention data privacy laws.
“Many edtech tools just include ChatGPT,” said Paul Burzyński, Smartschool’s chief product officer.They have no understanding of what the student is actually working on in the classroom.“
That gap between impressive AI demonstrations and realistic classroom needs is what Smartschool set out to address. Burzyński has led the translation of advanced AI capabilities into classroom-ready workflows, working with teachers, students, and school districts to ensure that technology supports learning rather than disrupting it.
Mathematical thinking
At the heart of its platform is a mathematical reasoning engine developed under the product vision of Chief Product Officer Paul Burzyński and implemented by CTO Kajetan Lewandowski’s engineering team. Unlike general-purpose AI systems, the Smartschool platform was designed specifically for real-world classroom situations, combining instructional workflows with advanced mathematical reasoning capabilities.
“Can evaluate student’s handwritten work, interpret diagrams and geometric constructions, and evaluate open-ended solutions,” explained Burzynski.This is important because student learning is not limited to multiple choice answers; usually involves demonstrating thinking steps and making mistakes that reveal thought processes.“
Rather than simply providing answers like a GPT-powered Chatbot or a search engine, the Smartschool system is designed to provide structured feedback that helps students improve their thinking. The company reports that its system achieves 99.6 percent accuracy when testing and providing answers to high school-level math problems. The goal is not just accuracy, but educational assistance.
Under Burzyński’s brand leadership, the Smartschool team designed a system for scale and classroom integration. It can be integrated with existing learning management systems, curriculum, and single sign-on platforms. Teachers can reassign work with one click, while student submissions are automatically organized and synced with grade books. Teachers get information about students’ progress and misconceptions as well.
“This design ensures that technology is compatible with existing teaching workflows instead of forcing schools to adapt to new systems,” Burzynski said.
AI that teachers and students can trust
As CEO, Masłowski led the expansion of Smartschool to US school districts while working closely with teachers and administrators to ensure the platform delivers measurable learning outcomes. Alongside Burzynski and Lewandowski, he helped demonstrate the reliability of the program in schools using AI-powered learning tools for the first time. But teachers are holding on, encouraged by early success stories. Smartschool now operates in 30 US school districts, including within the New York City Department of Education and Boston Public Schools. And there are measurable results. A study from the Learning Experience Design Research Institute found that 90 percent of students using the platform in Wisconsin’s Pewaukee School District met or exceeded standards in math, for example.
Investors, and the media, have also taken notice. The company in April raised $3 million in seed funding from private angels Mati Staniszewski (ElevenLabs), Marcin Żukowski (Snowflake), and Nick Woods (HazelHealth), as well as Inovo VC, a16z Scout Fund, and The Explorer Fund. A few investors were the group’s early supporters. Both Masłowski and Burzyński were also recognized in Forbes 30 Under 30.
According to Maslowski, although it takes time to build trust in a market like edtech, the types of relationships a company builds, based on its experience and capabilities, should be around for a long time. “From the beginning, our focus has always been the same,“he prunes.”We want to build AI that teachers can trust and that improves real educational outcomes in classrooms.“
