Commercialisation

of Education

EdTech_in_the_Classroom__Progress_or_Peril_.mp4

Defintion

Commercialisation is the creation, marketing and sale of educational goods and services, by external providers, for profit and often includes curriculum content, assessment services, digital lerarning, professional learning to name a few (Hogan et al., 2017; Hogan, 2018). The commercialisation of education and AI often identifies a way in which the product can be embedded into established classroom practices (Kelkar, 2022), making it a seamless inclusion for teachers and students.

Think any of the educational tools, platforms and systems being used in classrooms and educational settings today.

Potential Benefits

systems and tools can act as intelligent tutoring systems (Kelkar, 2022)
enables students to practice skills at their level
less preparation time required by teaching staff to create differentiated experiences for students, can use the 'off the shelf project' which will adapt to meet the mastery of the student (Hogan et al., 2017)
teachers have the option of outsourcing through the tool if they are not familiar with the content (Hogan et al., 2017)
may support students such as those with English as an Additional Language/Dialect (EALD) backgrounds to provide inclusive support and education (Creagh et al., 2023)

Limitations and Risks

Edtech companies are designing the curriculum not according to pedagogy. This is taking the learning design away from trained and experienced educators and put in a for-profit model which produces many ethical and educational concerns.
one size does not fit all - particularly when needing to differentiate and consider all students learning needs (Hogan et al., 2017)
students may become too embarrassed to ask for help if they do not understand the mastery and content provided in the system/tool/platform (Kelkar, 2022)
Education tools are easy to access, therefore, there is a need for approropriate frameworks and due diligence to ensure suitability and application for use in education (Centtre for Education Statistics and Evaluation, 2024)
deprofessionalisation of teachers as their autonomy on content is reduced (Hogan et al., 2017)
for schools and educational facilities, particularly in lower socio-economic areas, students may not have the opportuntiy to access the tools and may widen gaps in education and access to digital and AI technologies (Hogan et al., 2017)
approropriateness for the curriculum and adaptablity of the products for students with additional needs such as EAL/D (Creagh et al., 2023).

Real World Example 1

Delivering English as an Additional Language/Dialect (EALD) to a student may benefit from the use of commercialised products, particularly with intelligent and AI tutoring systems to support their English and Literary skills. This risk of tools in this way is that these tools are often designed and created with an 'assumption' of English as the primary language, therefore, the tool may be ineffective. Therefore, additional support may still be required including one on one support or additional purposefully created and modified resources for the student.

Real World Example 2

An off the shelf product may be selected by a school to introduce concepts to students, however, as the product has been designed for 'entertainment' it may not align with curriculum requirements. In addition these items are 'for profit' therefore sales of the product support the business, not necessarily the student, therefore raising ethical and educational concerns with these form of products.

Real World Example 3

A teacher may identify an open access tool to support students in their class. However, these tools, in order to be accessible to so many, do not contain curriculum content. As a result, teachers need to invest time to upload relevant information in order to make it useable and practical for students in their class. This demonstrates an inefficiency in the process for teachers.