Will AI be able to replace teachers?

First of all, wishing you a happy new year 2020. Yes, it’s necessary to wish as a new year marks a new beginning. It’s actually to make you realize that this is 2020. The year that we, generation X has looked up to. With the pace of the technological advancements that happened in the 90’s and the first decade of 2000’s, 2020 was to be considered a revolutionary year, the year that will make the beginning of an era where there would be flying cars, sky-kissing skyscrapers, technology to teleport objects, robots would replace maids, assistants and maybe even teachers! Well, to an extent this has all been done but the pace is still slow enough to give us a chance, to ponder upon where we are being led to.

Let us break our questions into simple parts, Can Teachers be replaced by Artificial Intelligence? Should Teachers be replaced by AI?

What impact would it have on the education sector? Most importantly, how will this replacement affect the moral development of the coming generations?

We all are now aware that there is technology to assist students, one can find solutions to questions online, there are vlogs by educators who teach topics on various social media platforms and now there are specific apps also dedicated to the education sector where educators go online and teach students various topics. Looking at this perspective, it’s very much possible that this can even be done by a robot which possesses AI as initial data can be fed into it and it will adapt and respond to situations (primarily questions or doubts of students regarding the subject being taught).

Pondering on whether teachers should be replaced, we must listen to both the point of views Why should they be replaced? Well, because teachers in the current times are not being teachers, due to increase in consumerism culture, education has also become a contract of give and take where the society now thinks that if they are paying the school fees, the teacher is bound to teach their child, ignoring the quality of teaching that’s being done. So, if this is the case that human emotions are not being taken into consideration, a robot can very well replace teachers. Why shouldn’t teachers be replaced? Yes, you are right. This made you realize the need of a teacher and absence of a robot. It is that a robot cannot understand the human sentiments that define teaching because teaching is not just delivering information, it is the give and take of knowledge and sharing of experiences, it’s the process of passing down experiences from one generation to the other. Passing on values and emotional connect that a student teacher bond develops will also be a thing of past if teachers are replaced by AI.

The impacts of replacement, economically, it would affect the jobs in this sector, it would increase capitalism further and thus consumerism culture. Education would then become even more unaffordable and unapproachable for the common man.

Needless to say that the moral thread of the society will also be affected if it’s a robot who is ‘teaching’ you rather than a teacher.

You ask me how. Well. I leave that to you, Revisit your school days, you will find various examples to help me reinforce my perspective.

Before you begin pondering, we have some good news to share with you. The first one being that our school has been adjudged 4th in ATL this year and that we are beginning a course on Artificial Intelligence for students of grade 9 and above the next year onwards.