South Dade Teacher Named 2025 Mark Cuban Fellow

A South Dade Senior High School teacher has received a high honor and an opportunity to learn more about artificial intelligence (AI) technology — and share that knowledge with his colleagues.

Mark Godinez, a gaming and virtual reality teacher at South Dade, has been named a 2025 Mark Cuban Teacher Fellow. The fellowship will allow him to explore the use of AI in education.

“This fellowship is a yearlong professional development program to empower me to learn about AI and how to introduce it in teaching,” Godinez said. “It will include training and mentorships with like-minded colleagues. We have AI introduced to integrate into school.”

The meetings will be held online, with a three-day boot camp program scheduled in Miami.

“I think it’s important so I can learn how it works and how to use it ethically,” he said. “I want to be able to train other teachers and students in the district on what I learn during this yearlong program.”

“The Mark Cuban Teacher Fellow program provides a framework for how I and other fellows will engage with AI education,” Godinez added.

The AI training will show teachers how to facilitate AI boot camps for high school students, implement ethical AI policies, and create classroom or school-based projects.

“It will provide twice-monthly virtual meetings with a community of educators and an opportunity to present my work at a national conference,” Godinez said.

He believes the fellowship will give him valuable skills.

“I will use the fellowship to gain expertise in AI, develop and implement AI-related educational projects at South Dade Senior High School, and share my knowledge with both students and fellow educators,” he said.

Another important goal, he added, is to support the new Academy of Artificial Intelligence led by Patricia Pasarin — a new program at South Dade.