Content-type: text/html Downes.ca ~ Stephen's Web ~ Artificial intelligence in education: what issues do we need to start considering now?

Stephen Downes

Knowledge, Learning, Community

I like to think I've covered that, and would ague that we need to consider these issues in light of the benefits AI offers as well, but Michael Webb is right in saying we need to be considering these questions. But his first statement suggests what he thinks the real issue is: "The first thing to emphasise is that AI will never replace teaching staff – nor would we want it to." Is this true? It depends on what you mean by 'replace' - technically, cutting the cost of labour by 96 percent (which is what Echo did for the Brussells Times) isn't 'replacing', but I'm sure a lot of people would feel replaced. But if we could teach effectively at a fraction of the cost, wouldn't we want to?

But let's skip to the main point of this article, which is to introduce the newest edition of Jisc's AI in tertiary education report (32 page PDF). The report goes straight to a specific application of AI: AI-powered personalised learning. This, I think, is based in the typical descriptive-diagnostic-predictive-prescriptive data maturity model. But I think AI goes well beyond that, and have added two categories (generative and deontic) which are already well within today's AI capabilities. And similarly, I think the report's risk-based treatment of ethical issues isn't sufficiently comprehensive. I'm not saying the report is wrong in any sense - and indeed, it gets much more right than many similar publications. But I think it's incomplete in some important respects.

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Stephen Downes Stephen Downes, Casselman, Canada
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Last Updated: May 08, 2024 12:07 a.m.

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