A study by the Center for Universal Education at the Brookings Institution has found that given the current trajectory of GenAI and its implementation and use, the potential risks to students outweigh the benefits.
However, it stressed that it’s “not too late to bend the arc of AI use to enrich, rather than diminish, student learning and development.”
The report, dubbed “A new direction for students in an AI world: Prosper, Prepare, Protect”, provides a framework for action for all parties including schools, businesses, governments, and families.
Since the introduction of ChatGPT and with the public’s growing familiarity with GenAI, the education community has been debating its promises and dangers. Instead of waiting for a decade to conduct a thorough investigation on the failures and opportunities it brings, the Institution’s Center for Universal Education initiated a year-long global study to understand the possible dangers that these tools pose to students, and what can be done to prevent them, while still maximizing their benefits.
“At this point in its trajectory, the risks of utilizing generative AI in children’s education overshadow its benefits.”
The study conducted interviews, held focus groups, and consulted with more than 500 students, teachers, parents, education leaders, and technologists from 50 countries. It also reviewed over 400 studies.
“This is largely because the risks of AI differ in nature from its benefits—that is, these risks undermine children’s foundational development—and may prevent the benefits from being realized,” Brookings said.
The study found that AI can both benefit and hinder students, depending on how it is used. “We all have the agency, the capacity, and the imperative to help AI enrich, not diminish, students’ learning and development.”
In short, the Institution said:
- AI-enriched learning. Well-designed AI tools and platforms can offer students a number of learning benefits if deployed as a part of an overall, pedagogically sound approach.
- AI-diminished learning. Overreliance on AI tools and platforms can put children and youth’s fundamental learning capacity at risk. These risks can impact students’ capacity to learn, their social and emotional well-being, their trusting relationships with teachers and peers, and their safety and privacy.
It also offered three pillars for action: Prosper, Prepare, and Protect. Under each pillar, it provides actionable recommendations for governments, technology companies, education system leaders, families, and everyone affected by this issue.
“We urge all relevant actors to identify at least one recommendation to advance over the next three years.”
Above all, Brookings said its report is a call to action. “While AI’s potential negative risks and the damages it has already caused are daunting, they are fixable. We should neither capitulate to these harms nor focus solely on limiting their repercussions.”
Oliver Simonnet, Lead Cybersecurity Researcher at CultureAI, commented: “Education is definitely one of the areas where AI has spread fast, with both students and faculty using it for many different tasks. While there are benefits, one of the most significant risks in education is cognitive offloading.”
He said as students and teachers offload their critical thinking and problem solving needs to AI systems, there is a real risk that true learning and knowledge retention will decline, resulting in graduates who lack the skills the qualifications claim they possess.
“The solution is not to block AI though, its not realistic or effective, as it simply drives users to bypass restrictions. The challenge instead is educating in AI use and facilitating its safe and responsible use though AI usage control solutions that can maintain accountability and oversight. This will be difficult challenge in education (in contrast to more tightly managed corporate environments) but I believe it is a more reliably way forward than outright blocking use.”
Information Security Buzz News Editor
Kirsten Doyle has been in the technology journalism and editing space for nearly 24 years, during which time she has developed a great love for all aspects of technology, as well as words themselves. Her experience spans B2B tech, with a lot of focus on cybersecurity, cloud, enterprise, digital transformation, and data centre. Her specialties are in news, thought leadership, features, white papers, and PR writing, and she is an experienced editor for both print and online publications.
The opinions expressed in this post belong to the individual contributors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Information Security Buzz.