Alter State has already kickstarted its Women Innovation Sprint Program within the first problem-finding masterclass, which took place online on June 9. Together with inspiring women innovators, we enjoyed listening to international speakers, presenting the latest trends and prospects of the future of energy, future of healthcare, future of education and future of cities & mobility. If you haven't registered yet, feel free to secure a seat for your lextraordinary learning journey with a few clicks.
During the masterclass, we had a chance to listen to Gediminas Buivydas, the head of Digital Innovation LAB at ISM University of Management and Economics, who shared his point about edtech. Since the future of education is one of the core areas, which the Women Innovation Program is directed towards, in this article, the Alter State team is excited to highlight the significance of the educational sector and share the key insights of the edtech development.
Let’s welcome a modern age teacher mr. Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence plays a more and more massive role in transforming the education industry. According to a report (2019), the usage of AI-based tools in the education market amounted to over 375 million dollars in 2018 and is expected to grow by 2808.5 million dollars by 2025. AI transforms the education sector in different ways: 1) optimizing students' learning and grading process; 2) reshaping the educational workforce; 3) growing demand for AI-focused study programs.
Firstly, various edtech products and services offer an opportunity to use AI to optimize students' learning and grading processes. The platform, called Century, brought a fully personalized learning journey to life. It helps to track student progress, recognizes information gaps and offers personal study recommendations. Century also reduces time spent planning, grading and managing homework. Needless to say that automated tools transform the educational jobs' landscape. To be clear - transforming doesn't mean stealing existing jobs from teachers or other school staff. The AI platform instead reshapes the required skill base to run such educational programs. With time, teachers will need to at least have and improve current digital competencies to work with AI-powered edtech tools properly. Finally, the emergence of AI influences the rising demand for AI-related study programs. For example, an Introduction to Machine Learning course grew twelvefold between 2010 and 2018 at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2020). Moreover, more and more AI-focused online courses are available on the internet, showing the rapidly growing potential for AI specialists in the work industry.
The emergence of STEM-focused study programs
Following the example of AI-related study programs’ demand, the technology spread also influenced the need for STEAM-focused study programs. The STEAM acronym stands for science, technology, engineering, arts and maths. Regarding the European Parliament currently, nearly half of the STEAM occupations require medium-level qualifications, meaning the demand for STEAM skills matters to both upper-secondary and university graduates (2015). During the past years, the spread of science, technology, education and mathematics-related labour influenced various educational institutions to start integrating such topics or courses into study programs.
The STEAM market and the demand for such study programs weren't only accelerated by the fast tech development. STEAM jobs bring enormous value to countries' economies. According to a McKinsey & Company report, STEAM businesses are 40% more efficient as well as export revenue from the products generated is 24% higher than other businesses in Denmark (2018). Although, the booming STEAM industry creates another problem - lack of diversity, which didn't escape Denmark either. Regarding the results of Plan International and Telenor Group's report on gender segregation in the tech sector in Scandinavia states that 22% of women in Denmark aren't interested in choosing to work in STEAM professions due to the prevailing stereotype that STEAM jobs are considered more "male" (2019). Moreover, according to the same report, 62% of women face gender segregation in pursuing a career and/or education in STEM. Having mentioned research results in mind, the business or educational STEAM sector faces a vast emergence. Also, it creates a need to fight against the existing diversity cliché.
Photo author: WebFactory Ltd
Is getting your degree online the new black?
Just imagine being a fresh school graduate in 2010. Suppose you decide to study right after school. In that case, you have to make a significant step - choose the university or even the country where you will dedicate your 3-5 years of life. Leaving your home can correlate with many feelings, including homesickness, adapting to a new culture or climate.
Over the decade from 2010, digital improvement made study processes more flexible. People who want to gain specific knowledge can choose online courses instead of studying at local or foreign universities. A survey of e-learning and digital education showed that 52% of graduate U.S students found their online college-level education to provide a better learning experience than their college-level classroom education (2019).
Also, the pandemic pushed the digitization of the educational sector to another level. Now, we have opportunities to gain a degree while studying entirely online. According to the global e-learning market research report (2021), the training professional, governmental-related, and academic was estimated at around USD 134 billion in 2020. Such an institution as Open University allows you to learn different subjects, easily manage your studies with your work, and benefit from the convenience of e-learning. The research details and examples mentioned earlier reflect just a minor angle of happening transformations in the educational industry. Still, we can see the enormous growth of the e-learning industry.
Photo author: Chris Montgomery
The Alter State Women Innovation Program is tailored for women but OPEN for everyone. We welcome new participants to join further sessions, such as User Interview, Creativity and the main innovation sprint.
Learn more about the Program here. Reserve your seat at the promising learning journey together with us!
Written by Kristina Kirkliauskaite