Disruption in Education by Artificial Intelligence
- dnyaneshchaudhari0
- May 28
- 5 min read
G. Balasubramanian
Educator, Former Director of Academics, CBSE
G. Balasubramanian is a doyen of school education in India. He has held several positions of leadership at CBSE, including Director Academics.
He was the brain behind the introduction of several innovations at CBSE, which included frontline curriculum, communicative approach to language teaching, information technology, alternatives to homework, etc. He is also an author, poet and a sought-after speaker at educational conferences world over.
“What could be the impact of AI in school education and in which direction would things move?” asked a friend during a formal conversation. I remained silent. After a while I replied, “If you ask me in which direction the eye of a cyclone is moving, I can tell you, but not the direction in which AI is moving.” He laughed and asked “Cyclone?” I said “Well you can substitute this word with a hurricane, a tornado, or any other disruptive impact on our lives. Anything would fit.” I am sure it would be difficult even for soothsayers and futurologists to predict, because of the three of its associated properties – skill, scale and speed. It has the potential to impact the entire universe of learning and thus operating at all 360 degrees.
“By far, the greatest danger of Artificial Intelligence is that people conclude too early that they understand it,” says Eliezer Yudkowsky, co-founder and research fellow at the Machine Intelligence. Thus, we could see the level of impact it could make the entire operative universe of knowledge, but it would be foolish to arrive at any conclusions too soon. AI expert Kai-Fu-Lee observes, “AI is going to change the world more than anything in the history of humanity. More than electricity.”
Disruption in content management
In the knowledge universe, the disruptions that could occur would include – Content conceptualization, content design, content architecture, content packaging and content delivery. This would trigger a series of disruptions in the thought conceptualization, thought architecture, thought navigation, thought dynamics and its resultant outcomes. This would certainly impact the content managers to deal with knowledge with new perspectives by forcing them to open their third eye to critically evaluate their operatives for processing knowledge and to repack them to suit the shifting paradigms of human intervention with knowledge.
Any premise that the content delivery will move away from its past projection through print media towards the electronic media is a wishful thinking. While this could happen to a larger percentage of knowledge dynamics in human communications and conversations, the foundations of the print media are strong enough to withstand this turbulence. Its emotional relationship with human learning systems would not let them to be swept away too soon or to be laid under a carpet. The educators would be forced to deal with bifocal approaches to knowledge navigational processes at least for a few decades to come, by which time one could decipher the shelf-life of AI-induced processes.
Pedagogical designs management
There is no denial to the fact that AI-based content navigation and processing, would induce newer ways pedagogical interventions in classrooms at all levels of learning. The purpose and meaning of learning are likely to be immensely impacted triggering extensive self-learning and self-directed learning. It would mean that the teacher-learner relationships are likely to undergo a huge transformation, forcing teachers to be more relevant, more techno-savvy, more professional and more imaginative. The caricatures of learning, as defined in the earlier philosophical and psychological foundations would need re-engineering. The ‘learnability’ of the learner becoming more intensive, immersive, passionate and focused, the classical menu-driven approach of learning would pave way for a more liberal ‘buffet-based’ approach facilitating the content to be more reachable through interactive pedagogy.
Knowledge creation
The tools and inputs of AI-based systems could facilitate creation of ‘new knowledge’ which could be put into periodic validation tests. Nevertheless, human curiosity would force such entrepreneurial interventions, whatever be the standard and quality of their offerings. AI is also likely to play a significant catalytic role in promoting inter-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary consideration of content and knowledge, creating more platforms of knowledge consideration. Entrepreneurs of knowledge systems may have a hay-day opening innumerable avenues for knowledge marketing in learning systems.
Credibility of the content
The validity and credibility of the content created through AI systems would call for intensive scrutiny regarding their authenticity and vulnerability. Extensive and exclusive dependence on that content for any sensitive and delicate objectives would not be advisable initially until appropriate filters and flags are set in place for the consumers. They may be good assets for gamification and proximate learning. “Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history. Unfortunately, it might also be the last, unless we learn how to avoid the risks,” says Stephen Hawking,
AI for research and deep learning
As an interactive and playable tool with information, strategized thinking, it could be helpful for intensive explosion of knowledge to seek deeper meanings and insightful information both for research and application. The current usage of AI-based tools appears to provide positive indicators in this domain. Some of the outcomes in medicine, clinical treatment, engineering, business analysis are striking and do some tangible results that could infuse confidence in our minds. Nevertheless, it is only at the embryonic stage. The huge investments several countries seem to be making is reflective of a bright future in understanding and application of AI.
Institutional dynamics
AI could indeed facilitate the institutions to seek, design and engage with the futuristic vision of their organization. It could help in planning, designing, articulating and processing with the needs of the future at an early stage. It could also help in strategic management of institutional resources to engage with them optimally and meaningfully. It could provide a competitive analysis of their status with the universe in which the institutions exist and operate. It could also help in the design of the institutional learning curve as well as the learning curve of each learner and to understand and bridge the gaps if any.
The future
While AI offers a prospective wholesome future in dealing both with the knowledge universe and operational dynamics, it is important to move ahead with caution and optimal pace. An overenthusiastic AI investor might have to face elements of uncertainty and insecurity as they progress. The caution given by Stephen Hawking in the following words is indeed worth reflecting upon: “The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of humans…. It would take off on its own, and re-design itself at an ever-increasing rate. Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, could not compete, and would be superseded.”