At this year’s Labour Party Conference, the Education Policy Institute has partnered with ASCL to hold a public panel on: ‘Can technology solve the challenges facing education?’
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become closely associated with the government’s efforts to enhance efficiency in public services. The AI Opportunities Action Plan promises to “unleash the power of AI to deliver a decade of national renewal” and to shape how AI will be used in our working lives. In education, AI has the potential to open up new opportunities and assist with the time-consuming administrative tasks that are currently a burden on teachers’ workloads. With this potential for future automation, what new opportunities and challenges will be afforded through embedding AI into the fabric of school systems?
The rate of teachers leaving the profession has been persistently high since the pandemic, alongside workload pressures and working hours increasing significantly. This is despite the focus of government policy on workload reduction, including the DfE Workload Reduction Toolkit. AI tools that could transform school operations are now being developed to assist teachers with a wide range of tasks. This includes administrative duties, generating educational resources, and assisting with assessment and feedback to provide personalised learning support in a fraction of the time.
To fully realise this potential, reliable technology must be available to equip teachers with the support they need, so they can spend more time helping every pupil to succeed. However, inequality in digital access is a significant challenge that must be overcome to ensure that embedding AI does not exacerbate the disadvantage gap. Reliable internet access is currently not standard across all schools, and the government is planning to invest £45 million to enhance digital connectivity in schools nationwide to ensure everyone can benefit.
This panel will bring policymakers, education leaders and sector specialists together to consider the potential for AI to resolve some of the critical challenges in the education sector, including retention and workload. The panel will consider whether automation will increase the attractiveness of the profession to aid the workforce crisis, and whether current policies go far enough to address the digital divide in schools. AI can also pose several ethical risks to privacy and data protection, as well as to cybersecurity and discrimination. The panel will therefore consider what more is needed to prioritise children’s rights and their safety, and ensure that policies also protect the integrity of the education system as a whole.
Speakers will be announced in due course.
** Note: This event will take place in the conference secure zone. To access the secure zone you will need to obtain a pass directly from the Labour Party.**
