In 2023, IATELS held its 5th International Conference on Pedagogical Advances in Technology-Mediated Education which is already known as ICPATME for short.
Many thanks to the key contributors to ICPATME 2023 which embraced speakers and presenters from India, Turkey, Mexico, China, Thailand, UK, USA, Australia, Philippines, Pakistan and other countries.
As the main conference topic was Artificial Intelligence: Education, Society, Ethics, the speakers and participants made presentations on the related issues, discussed current concerns regarding AI in different fields of human life, highlighted preliminary findings and outcomes from the research which are intensively going on in different countries.
In her overview of the current policies and practices concerning AI, The Conference Chair, Prof. Dr. Iryna Sekret discussed main directions in the development of AI tools and their applications in education. The knowledge gaps as well as perspective fields of research and development on AI were highlighted in the presentation too.
By sharing their experiences and visions, the conference speakers and participants expressed their belief that progressive development of AI is going to facilitate teachers’ work rather than to become a threat to the employment of teachers and instructors.
Concerning other fields of works, for example, medicine, the researchers shared their doubts that AI technologies can be fully trustful in taking crucial decisions concerning patients’ life.
At the same time, such areas as jurisdiction and law can benefit from developing massive databases operated by AI for better analysis of the cases and application of the law in different cases and situations.
The conference discussions and presentations brought to the attention important issues which arose in the international academic community as a reaction to the development of AI and its integration in different spheres of human life:
- Rapid development of AI brings a plenty of concerns in human minds, fears in front of the unknown and frustration about the future of work, human’s employability as well as reliability of AI tools.
- AI tools are not perceived as reliable sources of information and data which can be unquestionable in their application especially in such crucial areas as medicine, health, science and education.
- Together with fears that AI may replace human beings, there is a belief that AI should be considered as a vehicle to facilitate human’s work rather than to replace a human.
- Gaps in data, a lowered flexibility to use the data for solving certain problems apart from the absence of creativity and a capacity for creative integrity, AI tools are perceived as a technology to cope with routine assignments rather than dealing with complex problems. Though, it is believed that the situation is going to change for more tremendous effects in a view that AI continue to boom in its development.
ICPATME 2024 is planned to follow the initiatives of ICPATME 2023 to explore AI in education and society.
We are looking forward to more case studies, best practices and overviews of experiences on implementing AI in different social, educational and business contexts.