How to Learn AI Without a PhD: Math Anxiety, Tutorial Hell and AI Literacy | Terezija Semenski

Do you need a PhD in math to understand AI? Terezija Semenski, mathematician, software engineer, founder of Stack Labs and LinkedIn Learning instructor with 15 courses, tells host Henry Clavo why the answer is no, and why you still have to do the reps.
Who it's for: Developers, students and business leaders who want to learn AI fundamentals, and leaders building AI literacy across a company.

In this episode you'll learn:
- Why the real challenge is teaching people how to think with technology, not teaching the technology
- How to picture neural networks, vectors and matrices with simple visuals and metaphors
- Why math anxiety is one of the biggest barriers to learning AI, and how it affects girls in particular
- How to escape tutorial hell by picking one course and getting your hands dirty
- What an AI-literate company looks like, and why so few enterprises have AI integrated at scale
- Her advice for anyone intimidated by AI: start small, be curious and treat it like a playground

Terezija shares how she went from teacher and software engineering lead (including at Photomath, a Google company) to teaching more than 300,000 learners on LinkedIn Learning. She explains why she builds courses around small experiments like training a tiny neural network in PyTorch, why intuition should come before formulas, and what she sees in Stack Labs workshops: an MIT report on the state of AI in business found only 5% of enterprises have AI tools integrated in workflows at scale. She also talks about the machine learning book she is writing and her Math Mindset newsletter on Substack.

Chapters
0:00 Cold open
0:16 Orlando Insights Podcast intro
1:00 Meet Terezija Semenski
2:38 From teacher to AI instructor
4:26 Teaching people how to think with technology
8:20 Why AI education had to change
10:31 Explaining neural networks and linear algebra with metaphors
13:19 Math anxiety: the biggest barrier to learning AI
18:41 Escaping tutorial hell
20:26 Math Mindset: intuition before formulas
22:30 Stack Labs and why most companies struggle to scale AI
25:47 What an AI-literate company looks like
29:34 Advice for anyone intimidated by AI
30:29 Do the reps: you learn AI by building, not watching
33:06 Her machine learning book and what's next
36:52 Where to find Terezija
38:56 Outro

More episodes: https://orlandoinsightspodcast.com
Terezija Semenski on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/terezijasemenski/
Guest: Terezija Semenski, Founder of Stack Labs, LinkedIn Learning instructor and author of the Math Mindset newsletter (https://mathmindset.substack.com)
Host: Henry Clavo, Founder & CEO, Orlando Insight Group: https://www.linkedin.com/in/henryorlandoclavo/

The Orlando Insights Podcast is brought to you by Orlando Insight Group, data and AI advisory for CIOs and Chief Data Officers: AI Readiness Assessment, Data Governance & AI Foundations Sprint, and Fractional Chief Data & AI Officer. Book a free 30-minute AI readiness consult: https://calendar.app.google/xkJqUsFzrHAVkY4W7
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