There has been a significant rise in the development of artificial intelligence and its use in various industries. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a blooming and booming technological domain and has impacted day-to-day life. The use of AI in the education system has started producing novel teaching and learning solutions.
The various AI resources in the field of education are undergoing testing in some countries, while in some others, they are already in the implementation stage. AI in the education system brings with it a lot of new ways to learn, teach, and analyze huge volumes of data.
- Nearly 50 percent growth has been witnessed in the AI market globally between 2017 and 2020. (UNESCO Report)
- The market size of AI in education was more than USD 1 billion in 2020, and is expected to be USD 21.41 billion by 2028.
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated many schools and educational institutions adopting AI.
Several AI techniques are being adopted for the following purposes:
- K-12 education
- Teacher training
- Quality training
- Personalized learning
- Student assessment
- Examination and grading
- Assessment of project work and activities
- Language learning
AI-powered education is definitely the future, however, at present, there are some challenges in the use of AI in the education system.
Preparing the learners, teachers, and parents for AI-powered education
- The teachers, students, and parents are the most crucial parts of the education chain.
- For the use of AI in the education system to be successful, first both teachers and students need to understand and embrace it, followed by the parents too.
- Preparedness for AI is a two-way process.
- First, the teachers need to understand the latest AI developments and AI resources to teach the learners in a fun and interactive way.
- Second, the AI developers need to learn the mindset and functioning of teachers to create robust AI-powered solutions that can be easily implemented in the real-world environment of the classrooms.
Transparency and ethics about data
- With AI in the education system, there is a huge volume of data and information being collected and disseminated.
- When we talk about data ethics in an AI society, the main question that pops up is data security and privacy.
- The personal data of learners, teachers, and parents is always at risk from hackers and cyber criminals.
- There are individual preferences for use and access of personal data which must be respected.
- For responsible AI to come to the front, it is important to create AI regulations that take care of transparency, data ethics, privacy, and security.
Developing powerful and top-notch data systems
- Most of the data that is generated today is scattered, unevenly distributed, and most importantly incomplete in nature.
- The learning results of students are directly related to various factors such as socio-economic, family, health, background of students, and even policies of the government.
- In order to include all these parameters, comprehensive and robust AI-powered data systems are needed.
- However, these AI data systems would be quite expensive for the developing nations.
Developing comprehensive policies for the use of AI in education system
- AI-powered education has tremendous scope and potential. However, for it to succeed and for the inclusion of AI in education, there is a need for creating all-inclusive public policies for the use of AI in the education system.
- The public policies from the Governments of various countries need to be aligned at both the national and international level to create a powerful and sustainable AI ecosystem.
Promoting the inclusion of everyone
- For AI in the education system to be successful, it is indispensable to bridge the gap and biases that exist in the learning environments.
- There is a digital gap or divide that exists amongst students from the developed nations and developing ones.
- There is a need to develop powerful AI infrastructure in developing nations.
- The data that we have with us today only represents a fraction of the students that are a part of the education system.
- It is crucial to foster inclusion and equity of everyone in AI in the education system.
In developed countries like China and the United States of America, most private companies are playing a crucial role in adopting AI for development in the education sector. The progress of AI in the education system is progressing continuously. However, there is a long way to go before it reaches its actual potential.
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