Learning made easy with 'Machine Learning'

The education industry is one of the most thriving sectors in India. While the pandemic brought with it various challenges, it also helped in digital adoption across all businesses. This trend was especially witnessed in the education sector. The teachers and students had to cope up with the changing times and had to move the learning sessions to the online medium.

To ensure that the educational firms and the ed-tech platforms extend the best of the knowledgeable sessions to their students, they need to be armed with state-of-the-art technology. The key technological advancement that has brought about a transformation in learning for the students is Machine Learning. Having this technology in place enables efficient and swift processing of big data thereby extending superior quality education to the students.

Importance of Machine learning in educational firms and ed-tech platforms

An extension of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML) provides the ability to the IT systems to interpret data at their end and self-educate basis the experience gained. Its primary objective is to grab hold of the required data, analyze it and accordingly create a problem and solution algorithm.

The best bit about this technology is that it does not require the assistance of humans or external coding. Every aspect of the process is covered by the machines only. A prominent example of this is when IT professionals communicate directly with their clients and provide them necessary solutions.

While machine learning is widely used in IT and e-commerce firms, it has acquired an important place in the education sector as well. It has now become the need of the hour rather than being a luxury. The most common ways in which we integrate machine learning with education are via learning analytics and educational data mining. Siri, the virtual assistant is another soon to become essential part of the e-learning process.

As reported by Technavio, the global market share of online courses based on machine learning technology is expected to grow at a CAGR higher than 16% by 2021. This growth will be driven primarily by the affordable large data volume storage and its efficient processing. It will further help in making the e-learning process interactive and result-driven.

Benefits of Machine learning in educational organizations and ed-tech platforms: Relevance of Machine Learning for students

Customization and personalization

Machine Learning algorithms analyze the mannerism by which the students explore the information they are provided with. In case, the students have grasped the topic well enough, they move ahead. But if not, then ML takes them back and makes them go through relevant points again to make them understand the concept better. They also keep track of the learning process of the students at an individual level. ML gives an edge to e-learning over classroom teaching by ensuring that the students learn effectively with the varied formats of content in an interactive, engaging, and techie manner.

Up gradation of content

Machine Learning helps to upscale the e-learning process by upgrading the content and tailoring it as per the present requirement. They analyze the quality of the content of the various courses offered and compare it with them. Then, they accordingly make changes in their courses to provide state of the art education curriculum to the students. This helps them give an edge over the players in the market as they pro-actively alter their courses to extend the best of the educational experiences to their students.

Ensures higher ROI

When ML is applied, students get personalized services. Additionally, Machine Learning provides real-time benefits to the students thereby leading to their increased adoption in the education system. The process of predictive analysis further helps keep track of the progress of every student and also enables their quick grading.

Provides instant solutions

When incorporated, Machine Learning enables the platforms to provide instant solutions to the queries of the students. This benefit of ML makes it increasingly accepted by the educational and ed-tech platforms.

Helps save time by taking up admin-related jobs ML helps save the time of students by automating the admin-related jobs. This makes the students devote their time wholeheartedly to their studies and assignments and they won't waste their time on the admin-related jobs.

Summing Up

By offering personalization, customization, and enabling the use of virtual assistants, Machine Learning has become increasingly relevant for students more than before. While it cannot replace the teachers, it is used as a system to support and assist the traditional teaching methods. Since, digitization is present and proliferating, with it, the technological advancements will amplify too. ML can't stay behind in the race considering the various benefits it offers and the wide scope it has. It has indeed revolutionized the education sector and will lead to further upscaling of the industry thereby being a major contributor to its growth.

(The author is a founder and CEO, Geeks for Geeks)