How AI in education can turn a bane

It’s often said that all inventions are devoid of value. One can use dynamite to destroy ends or harness its power for construction work. The same could be said about electricity, atomic energy and the Internet. What is often overlooked in the above aphorism is that most scientific and technological advances ‘complement’ human capabilities and, in some instances ‘, augment’ what humans can achieve but never entirely ‘substitute’ the very creators.

But that’s not true with one of the most salient inventions of recent times—Artificial Intelligence (AI). AI can potentially damage societies and generations if not kept in check. And one doesn’t have to crystal gaze into the future or read the pundits to come to this conclusion—the writing is literally on the wall.

Students have always been ahead of the teachers when embracing the latest and the riskiest. The proliferation of the Internet and search engines made subjects like general knowledge and even social studies banal. Wikipedia helped the students get up to speed on a topic before delving deeper. The utility of Google Scholar could be testified by any budding or established researcher, not to mention the several slide-sharing and video-downloading sites.

But this time, it is different. Chat GPT, Google Gemini, and other tools are causing irrecoverable educational damage. A student merely ‘speaks’ a query into this AI engine, and bang comes the pre-formatted response. Up to date with spell check, contextualisation, and even humour if you have the paid version. Google Lens even has the ‘homework’ button if the student works through the interface.

There’s an arms race at the campuses on who buys the latest editions of such hacks faster and upends the comprehension and imagination of the hapless teachers. There is hardly any thinking, let alone critical thinking. Resultingly, machines now have duets with humans instead of humans talking to each other. A teacher dishes out a canned question to be answered by an AI engine, to be immediately reviewed, often thoughtlessly, by another. Who is teaching? Who is learning? A student is teaching a machine to kick himself out of the job market shortly. While attempting to make machines more human-like, humans are becoming more machine-like. 

Here’s the paradox: Generative AI has disrupted education more than the industry. Across organisations, AI tools, like Microsoft Copilot, still require a lot of selling, and the adoption barriers are steep since the users fear their relevance and candidature. From the shop floor to the ivory towers, AI has, at best, served as an obedient complement to human talent, relegated to primarily routine, non-creative chores unless one’s sole job is to make colourful PPTs.

However, in education, the dynamics are the exact opposite. Students have no reservations about lapping up this new wonder, for the short-term rewards outweigh the long-term consequences, and in that age group, turning that one assignment on time dominates the cerebellum. The problem is far more exacerbated in an Indian context, as our education system is mainly rote learning-based. But how valuable is that student for the industry who had been on the crutches of AI all this while? It’s anybody’s guess. 

As such, we are facing a de-linkage between economic growth and employment. India might still clock above a 7 per cent GDP growth rate, but employment, especially skilled labour, would be daunting. The signs are already visible across the campuses of premier institutes, where zero-day and day-one placements are a distant past.

But when the student makes it to the job market, the manager will ask: I have Chat GPT on my computer, and the best of what money can buy—what can you offer me now?

Suddenly, the tide is low, and you are exposed. The fact that Generative AI is democratic hits you hard, and devoid of real problem-solving and critical thinking skills, you are left with little choice but to rehaul your entire knowledge base—which is easier said than done. By then, you have lost out on that essential ‘learning capability’, and your career stalls even before it takes off. 

How do we mount out of this slippery slope? Two suggestions: one for the teacher and another for the student. Teachers need to up the game. You need to be creative enough to design your classes, teaching pedagogy and methodology, including assignments and their evaluation in a manner that’s not amicable for AI-based treatment. This requires non-routine thinking, generating original content and devising assessments that do not test the pupil’s memory.

Think of in-class assignments, where students are barred from using laptops or mobile phones, and they get to work in groups to solve real-world problems. Adopt design thinking, creative problem-solving, and strategy classes.

Students need to develop some foresight and think beyond attendance and marks. It’s like they are eating the menu for the food, unbeknownst to the fact that marks serve, at best, an entry ticket and nothing more in the job market arena. They must consider a career over 40 years, not their immediate placements. They must focus on developing proprietary content, publishing it arduously and leveraging it as a signalling mechanism. At that age, it’s wise to take intellectual risks, put your thoughts out in short content, and discover new professions that suit your temperament and aptitude. But at any rate, one must treat technology, including the Chat GPT, as a force multiplier, not a force by itself.

Remember, you are the real deal. Let education not be industrialised anymore, for technology is a great slave but a tyrant master.