The advent of artificial intelligence has come on faster than anyone anticipated, forcing higher education, employers and industry to adjust.
“There is a lot of concern about artificial intelligence, and we are just on the front edge of this. ... It’s accelerated much faster than anyone anticipated, so across different industries that means that employers are thinking differently about what might be possible to automate. Things that seemed like they would be years out might only be a few months out,” Commissioner of Higher Education Harrison Keller said in an interview.
In higher education, there is a lot of debate and discussion about artificial intelligence and a lot of different opinions.
While AI was already out there, he said it has become more widespread and more powerful more quickly than anyone anticipated.
“We have students that are using ChatGPT to write their admissions essays, or to write papers for classes, or to help write programs or to help them edit their papers, so we in higher education are trying to figure out what the appropriate policies are. Of course, there have been other technologies that have been fundamentally disruptive to higher education that higher education has figured out how to adjust to, how to adapt and how to incorporate into teaching and learning research. I think this will happen with artificial intelligence also,” Keller said.
But AI promises many helpful use cases as well.
“Again, we're just at the front edge. I think it won't be long before all of us have much more powerful virtual assistants that will be important parts of our lives. We have that a little bit now where you can ask Siri or Google to help with information, or to read an email or text to you, or to give you directions. But the artificial assistants are becoming more and more powerful more quickly so that will be disruptive for the way a lot of teaching and learning happens in colleges, but it can also be disruptive in positive ways,” he added.
Keller said he sees a lot of promise in the area of assistance.
“The other thing that I'm particularly excited about is the AI tutor. ... AI tutors can coach you along the way, help identify where you're making mistakes and where there are misconceptions and help students correct their errors much faster. It's like having an on-demand math tutor that can help you correct your errors and better understand what you're learning," Keller said.
(c)2023 the Odessa American. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
