AI in the classroom: a blessing for learning or an ethical curse

In years past, if you visited a bookstore in the UK, you would likely come across university students crouched behind laptops, scouring through books, and trying to churn out papers for their professors.

Today, the scene is a little different, with one particular change standing out: most laptops will have two windows open, one with Microsoft Word and the other ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence tool by OpenAI that has taken the world by storm.

This alone shows how crucial artificial intelligence has become in students' lives, with a tremendous potential to revolutionize education in countries like the UK.

Students now have the opportunity to personalize and optimize their learning through AI-powered platforms.

Unlike traditional classroom environments that follow a uniform curriculum, AI-supported systems allow for personalized learning experiences tailored to each student's needs and pace of learning.

'Disruption' in the classroom

According to Rose Luckin, a professor of learner-centered design at University College London (UCL), AI has the capability to cause "considerable disruption in the education system."

"This could be beneficial if people are supported to understand how to use AI and integrate it into their teaching," she told Anadolu.

Luckin, who works at UCL's Knowledge Lab research center in London, points out that AI can enable individualized tutoring and support to help meet each student's needs.

"It can offer a range of ways to interact with learning resources, such as through voice-activated and conversational interfaces, which can be helpful for learners' diverse needs," she said.

For a really transformative change, she noted, AI could be used to study and visualize learner progress in real-time, going beyond traditional subject areas to measure things like students' resilience, motivation, and self-regulation.

AI-powered personalized learning platforms could provide individualized support for learners whenever they need it, not just during school hours, she added.

One bachelor-degree student, Linda from SOAS University, said ChatGPT's natural language processing capabilities had saved her time and money.

"As a foreign student studying here, I sent my articles to a native speaker for proofreading. Now, thanks to artificial intelligence, I can handle this myself and even save some money and it has significantly sped up my article writing process," she told Anadolu.

Others, like engineering student William, are a bit more "cautious" when it comes to artificial intelligence platforms like ChatGPT.

"Yes, the technology can be fascinating and useful, but I have some concerns. For example, ChatGPT is a fully automated system and can make errors while providing information.

"And also, I'm not really sure about its reliability. I've heard that ChatGPT can learn biases present in its training data, potentially resulting in misinformation or biased recommendations. So, it can mislead me," he explained.

Another concern Willian has is that by carrying out tasks that would normally require contact between people, AI might "diminish human interaction and weaken social bonds."

This is "what makes a human being. Isn't it?" he asked.

Great ethical challenges

Views on AI often vary, as these examples show, and are subject to debate. According to Luckin, the ethical challenges of AI in education are great.

"We need to consider many issues: The data used by the AI to learn — how is it stored, who can access it, is it secure, is the data representative of the population the AI is designed to serve or is it biased? The algorithms too must be ethically designed and transparent as must the reason the AI is being used," she explained.

"We need teachers to understand enough about AI to be part of the decision-making process about how it is used in education," she underlined.

Luckin also thinks policymakers who design the system need to decide and specify what they want the relationship between teachers and AI to be.

"And what they want the relationship between learners and AI to be. Once they know this, they can design the system to achieve the desired relationship. They also need to look at the future skills that students will need and redesign the curriculum in order to address these."

The UK government has already taken steps to understand how AI can be transformative in the education sector.

British universities and startups are at the forefront of developing tools for the economy in its new phase, prompting authorities to look for new ways to harness machine learning to assist public policies.

UK Education Secretary Gillian Keegan has introduced new technology standards for schools and colleges, optimistic about the increasing potential of AI in education.

However, despite this enthusiasm on the public policy front, experts remain skeptical about the readiness of AI to be effectively utilized in the classroom.

While describing AI as a "game changer," Keegan has acknowledged that it is not yet an immediate necessity in education despite its potential to be used in the future to alleviate time constraints faced by teachers.

AI is often celebrated as a potential remedy for various fundamental challenges in education, offering solutions to issues such as the shortage of qualified teachers, student underachievement, and the widening performance gap between affluent and disadvantaged learners.

Nevertheless, this underlines the need to address multiple considerations, from who will be involved in AI application in education and in what specific areas to the ultimate objective of using this technology in the classroom.