Searching for educational technology (edtech) can be overwhelming. The number of products available is daunting: for example, Apple’s App Store contains more than 80,000 educational apps. And for educators, the decision has high-stakes implications for budgets and student learning.
To assist in their search, some educators turn to online edtech product summaries. But it’s hard for these summaries to keep up with the pace of technology development. Product information can quickly become out-of-date, and it can take time to review new products.
With support from a Small Business Innovation and Research grant from the U.S. Department of Education, EdSurge and SRI International are exploring whether artificial-intelligence technology can help solve this problem. We are working on building an AI-based tool that collects and analyzes information from the web to automatically update existing tool descriptions and add new products to the EdSurge Product Index, a database that helps educators identify edtech products that meet their specific needs.
SRI has used similar technology for automatic extraction of experimental results from scientific publications, building databases about global news events, and automated assessment of student writing.
Can AI do the job? Does it fall short? You be the judge! EdSurge and SRI are running a study to test the AI-enhanced product index now. Educators, click here to participate in the study. It only takes 5-10 minutes. Your responses will help us understand how the AI enhancements are working.
Where else could AI go? SRI and EdSurge are using AI to speed up the pace of edtech product reviews. What other ways will we use AI to make education more efficient? Automated grading? Individualized feedback? The sky’s the limit!
