Bill Gates, a pioneer in the field of information technology, said on Tuesday that AI will play a bigger role in schools during the next 18 months.
In the days and weeks after ChatGPT was released, top-level businesspeople and government officials expressed great alarm. AI-powered ChatGPT can efficiently and affordably write emails and write code. Plagiarism in student writing has been the subject of heated controversy among educators. During a fireside chat at a conference in San Diego, Gates claimed that by the conclusion of the next school year, pupils will be better able to read and write owing to the introduction of AI technology in the classroom.
As one wise person once put it, “a good teacher takes your essay, marks it up, and says things like, ‘Oh, this isn’t clear, and the summary should have included this.'” “that is a high-level cognitive task, and software has had almost none of those,” the billionaire elaborated, adding that “except at the most basic level of grammar,” software has not been challenged in this way. “especially once you get out of a very templated writing exercise,” the author is quoted as saying, “the amount of feedback to help me improve my writing is very low, and these AIs are actually good at that.”
According to Gates, AI language tools will become lot more approachable as hardware and software continue to advance. The millions of dollars Gates has given to forward-thinking social initiatives and educational projects have made him a household name throughout the world. As a result, those from lower socioeconomic origins may find it easier to pursue higher education. “Most students can’t afford to have a tutor,” he said. Author writes, “this is especially true if you want that tutor to remember everything you’ve done and look at your whole body of work.”
Gates’ software business Microsoft, of which he is the largest single owner, invested billions in OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT. Many teachers are already benefiting from using the method with their students. A whopping 73% of teachers and 68% of students found the method helpful in the classroom, per study funded by the Walton Family Foundation.
ChatGPT never reuses content and does not search the web for previously published works, thus its articles may pass normal plagiarism tests. However, some astute programmers have built tools that can distinguish if an output was generated by ChatGPT or some other AI.
According to Gates, we are heading for a repeat of the dot-com boom of the 1990s if we hurry to build AI solutions for mass markets and incorporate them into consumer goods. “Now, there may be a few that completely surprise everyone and become the next Google or Microsoft based on their AI progress,” he said. However, I assure you that it won’t exceed 2%. The underlying technology may be completely free.
To paraphrase Gates, AI firms are “super interested” in finding educational applications for their products. The well-known non-profit Khan Academy develops free online tools to help students get into competitive universities and excel in challenging courses. Khan Academy has also released Khanmigo, an AI tool that uses students’ individual data to create individualized learning plans.