3 ways AI is changing education right now (and in the future)

New and creative uses of artificial intelligence are being developed every day. The potential of AI in education cannot be overstated. In edtech, the use of AI has flown largely under the radar thus far, but it has the potential to reimagine the student-teacher relationship and improve student outcomes across the board.

Insights and predictions for the future of AI in education and in edtech from industry experts agree on several overarching trends. Technology, led by an interest in AI-based solutions, will produce a completely new educational system, and these are some of the trends I see impacting the work that is being done in the industry.

1. AI will lead to even better personalization.

The primary trend is personalization and it’s easy to see why. Not all students learn the same, and hence they shouldn’t all be taught the same. For a very long time, the education system has followed the one-size-fits all approach to student learning. However, the truth is that every student is unique. The future will see AI systems customize the learning experience for students based on their strengths and weaknesses.

This will enable all students to enjoy the learning process. With the advent of AI in education, the students-to-one-teacher model is ripe for reinvention. AI will allow for students to access information along their own unique learning curve, positioning teachers to best advise students in a personalized way, rather than a way that works for all 30 students in a class.

2. Teachers will have more time for teaching.

AI can help reduce or even eliminate mundane administrative tasks like grading assignments, opening up more time to create bespoke lesson plans for each student.

An interesting and emerging trend that I think will continue to gain traction this year and for the next several years is in the area of teacher assistance applications. Improving OCR and NLP techniques, alongside lowering costs and greater availability to these sophisticated technologies, will enable a number of products aimed at helping teachers with administrative work like grading homework and classroom assignments. As these automated review and data collection systems roll out, we will start to see teacher assistance applications that act like recommender systems for teachers to improve outcomes in their classroom.

3. AI will help teachers get more powerful results.

Teachers will be able to augment their own experience, training, and instincts with sophisticated data from AI applications to create a more efficient learning environment and curriculum predicated on the needs and pace of the student.

The education system of the future is based on individual pace and progression with highly-adaptive content, and the testing that we know today will be replaced with interactive proof-of-knowledge mastery and the ability to apply the mastered knowledge in a meaningful simulation. We will no longer have grades like K-12, or standardized testing, and the role of the teacher will be much more aligned with that of an expert facilitator or education coach.

AI will produce novel and powerful new forms of learning, well beyond what we think of as education today. The concept of school will transform into systems of life-long learning that we will use from early childhood learning through occupational training and beyond.

The future of AI in education is only limited by our imaginations and the speed of how technology is developed. It’s an incredibly exciting time to be in the education space as AI will continue to make advances and leaps that we could have never predicted. Here’s to the bright future of education.