Overcoming Global Disparities and Fostering Evidence-Based Approaches in Education

The change in EdTech has to be backed by science, not hype. There has been a shift in the systemic language, there remains the collective obstacle, to ascertaining that the evaluative strictness and EdTech evidence are the same in the Global North and the Global South.

FREMONT, CA: The educational community has reached a common consensus about the long-overdue transformation of public education: the change in EdTech has to be backed by science, not hype. Although there has been a shift in the systemic language, there remains the collective obstacle, to ascertaining that the evaluative strictness and EdTech evidence are the same in the Global North and the Global South.

National Efforts

As the UK government has invested in education and as a result, the research and development of EdTech solutions have been expedited. In addition, the public-private cooperations in numerous European states, such as Sweden, have partly compensated for the resource restrictions in public schools and teacher communities are positioned as generators of evidence.

The members of the scientific community are taking action to include research at all the different levels of EdTech design with various EdTech network initiatives, whose goals are to allow to foster better global cross-sector partnerships toward shared impact goals. These attempts are all in an effort backed by the belief that EdTech will have a positive impact on growing children when its design, execution, and growth are driven by evidence. However, the evidence movement of EdTech is faced with the obstacle of the Global North and Global South differences.

The Differences of the Global South and the Global North

The primary obstacle is ascertaining that EdTech which is generated in the South is not blatantly adopting innovative projects which are made in the North. By using technologies such as generative AI and advanced data infrastructures, which are present in numerous apps and learning platforms, businesses and policy-makers can provide evidence to make real-time decisions and match various EdTech with different types of learners.

Intelligent EdTech can integrate generative AI into its designs and subsequently train different models with information obtained directly from and with the users. Still, the social and economic advantages of AI are geographically centralised in the Global North. To ensure impartiality in the new generation of EdTech, the AI models used in EdTech have to be trained with diverse populations.

The next challenge is regarding the Global North and the Global South disparity in the context of standards of proof and the assessment of the evidence. To evaluate the evidence of which learning platform or application functions, numerous Global North countries require evidence from randomised controlled trials (RCTs).

The Solution to These Challenges

As a first step, the innovation and research projects have to graduate beyond EdTech which sets its sights on conventional learning outcomes in the Global South and learning advancements in the Global North. An EdTech that is designed well can aid in boosting a child’s maths, literary, or STEM skills and therefore, address educational inequalities.

Numerous conventional skills are now being replaced by the use of AI. The innovations of EdTech in generative AI are advancing rather rapidly in the Global North and there is a possibility that it could monopolise the market if that development is not prioritised in the Global South countries.