Article 1
Why this app exists
Delta Drills is an intelligent tutoring system that serves the learner LeetCode-style problems to train PyTorch prerequisites specifically for the AI-safety ARENA curriculum. Given that it is an intelligent tutoring system, there are three markers that distinguish it in value from something like LeetCode or Khan Academy (or simply prompting ChatGPT or Claude as a tutor).
It is personalized, and AI-paced (as opposed to self-paced)
The app maintains a student model that estimates a student's strengths and weaknesses as they work. It then serves them the right concept at the right level of difficulty and scaffolding. Students move on from a concept when they have mastered it, rather than after they run out of time in a course where time conditions dictate keeping up with everyone else in your cohort (as with any in-person program).
It eliminates decision fatigue of choosing content, while preserving human connection
For this MVP, I target PyTorch, but these principles apply just as well to all the other concepts necessary for ARENA prerequisites (and beyond, to ARENA itself). In order to prepare for ARENA, the learner is left with prioritizing learning linear algebra, calculus, information theory, and neural networks, all before even touching the curriculum. Self-diagnosing and practicing the right concepts with the right investment becomes irrelevant if one has a tool that does all of that automatically. There are no modules to click on like one has with Khan Academy.
For the ARENA curriculum itself, one may wonder how this would align with a linear 8-week program. It doesn't. Or rather, not without adjustment. My vision is to give the option to go through the ARENA curriculum with Delta Drills driving it all. Interacting with other humans is also valuable, however, which is why I designed a path that syncs well with the in-person program. The curriculum already serves up suggested time limits for working on problems. If a learner spends 15 minutes on a problem they struggled with, they should spend time later shoring up the concepts that made it hard. Delta Drills queues that practice for them, so they keep pace with the cohort and the gaps still get closed.
It leverages the expertise reversal effect
Instruction that helps a novice can actively hurt someone further along. A full worked example is exactly what you need the first time you meet a concept; once you are competent, that same example gets in your way. So the app picks more than the concept. It also picks the level of support: a lesson or worked example when a concept is new to you, a partially worked example as you improve, and a bare problem once you are strong. Same material, support matched to where you stand.