Study Highlights Need for Quality Assurance to Maximize AI and EdTech Benefits for Australian Students
A new report by University of Technology Sydney (UTS) Industry Professor Leslie Loble AM and Dr Kelly Stephens, Director of Edtech and Education Policy at the UTS Centre for Social Justice and Inclusion, highlights the need for a rigorous process to ensure the best quality edtech is used in Australian classrooms.
The Australian edtech sector generates $3.6 billion annually, as AI and learning technology take hold in classrooms. At the same time, learning outcomes for Australian students are stagnant and equity gaps continue to grow.
To drive change, edtech – including AI-enabled applications – need to be well designed and effectively used, but in a rapidly growing sea of applications, it is almost impossible to know when that’s the case.
The report Towards high quality in Australian education technology was produced by the Australian Network for Quality Digital Education, supported by the Paul Ramsay Foundation and UTS. The Network was established following the publication of Professor Loble’s report Shaping AI and edtech to tackle Australia’s learning divide.
This new report urges policymakers to build a national quality assurance process for digitally enabled teaching and learning resources, with clear criteria and a robust and transparent assessment process. If implemented, it will ensure that all Australian students can benefit from the highest quality learning tools and curriculum resources.
Why do we need a quality assurance process for edtech?
Edtech is revolutionising teaching and learning worldwide.
However, a crowded and rapidly growing edtech market is making it difficult for teachers, schools and parents to know which applications are high quality and useful, with risks to better learning outcomes, equity, teacher workload and well-targeted investment.
“Teachers and parents are overwhelmed for choice from a booming edtech market, with 500,000 learning apps available online and more marketed directly to schools, but there’s no independent, comprehensive source of information about the quality of these resources in Australia,” said Professor Loble, Chair of the Australian Network for Quality Digital Education.
Edtech decision makers currently select and implement technologies with far too little information about what is likely to work in their schools. We are consequently spending untold amounts of money – in schools, and at home – on edtech that may be overused, underused, or ineffectively used. We know for certain it is inequitably used.
“The lack of clearly articulated quality expectations creates a significant risk that our students and schools may fail to benefit from the increased use of edtech. Additionally, we still lack system-wide regulatory standards and controls to prevent the tracking and scraping of children’s data from edtech platforms.
“Australia is falling behind other jurisdictions in implementing quality assurance processes in response to the growing reliance on edtech. Ensuring that Australian students are using the best evidence-backed digital resources, with strong safety and quality criteria in place, should be a priority for policymakers,” says Professor Loble.
The report, which was supported by the UTS Centre for Social Justice & Inclusion and Paul Ramsay Foundation, reviewed 11 existing quality assurance processes worldwide, and from there proposed six key areas of focus for Australia’s own process.
A quality assurance process will not only ensure that students have access to the best learning tools and technologies, but it will also help address Australia’s digital educational divide.
“All students, regardless of their background or circumstances, deserve equal access to high quality education,’ said Amy Persson, UTS Pro Vice-Chancellor (Social Justice & Inclusion).
By implementing a nationwide standard by which edtech is measured, we can ensure that all students can use and benefit from learning technologies, not just those who have the financial means to do so.
This sentiment is also echoed by John Bush, Head of Young People at the Paul Ramsay Foundation.
“We know that many Australian children who experience disadvantage are excluded in the digital world too. Right now, there’s a real opportunity for AI-based edtech to be a bridge to greater digital inclusion but also a real risk that AI will exacerbate a digital divide.
“To seize the opportunity, it’s crucial that we have quality assurance system that embeds digital inclusion in the design and use of AI-based edtech.”