Artificial intelligence to be used to ease NSW teachers’ workload

Progressive strategies to ease the workload of teachers drowning in paperwork and red tape will be implemented in NSW schools, including using artificial intelligence. Find out how it will work.

Teachers drowning in paperwork and red tape will have artificial intelligence and under-utilised bureaucrats take over their workload so they can do what they are supposed to do: Teach.

High school students would also be encouraged to consider teaching and teachers may even be offered affordable subsidised housing, under moves being considered by the NSW government.

In a wide-ranging interview with The Daily Telegraph, Acting Premier and Education Minister Prue Car said the government would do whatever it takes to get more teachers into the classroom.

She said the backbone of the entire education system and the solution to the myriad problems facing schools today — from discipline to academic outcomes — was getting more teachers delivering back-to-basics evidence-based lessons.

Acting Premier and Education Minister Prue Car said the government would do whatever it takes to get more teachers into the classroom. Picture: Tim Hunter.

To this end almost nothing is off the table. Measures being rolled out or actively considered by the government include:

■ Using AI for non-teaching functions, including increasingly burdensome paperwork and time-consuming tasks;

■ Using Education Department bureaucrats to handle more administrative and commercial activities on behalf of schools, freeing up principals and leadership teams to focus on teaching;

■ Principals encouraging their own students in Year 10 and 11 to go into teaching as a profession; and

■ Making housing more affordable for teachers and other frontline workers such as police, paramedics and nurses.

The education department are running AI trials to help support teachers with onerous tasks. Picture: Sebastien Bozon/AFP

Ms Car said AI was starting to be deployed for onerous tasks that were important but not directly related to learning, such as conducting risk-assessments for school excursions.

“We’re running a trial of this AI app to make it easier for run-of-the-mill things in certain schools — they’re doing it and then we’ll assess how it’s gone,” she said.

“Things like excursion risk assessments: You could plug in: ‘I’m taking my Year 8 kids to Taronga and I have a child in a wheelchair.’”

The minister said a previous policy to give more autonomy to schools had benefited some but left others struggling.

“What ended up happening is principals were pretty much left to fend for themselves and ended up having to be business managers as well as educational leaders,” she said.

“And there’s always going to be a part of that, but with huge bank accounts and all this pressure in admin work they were then having to create staff to be able to deal with all the added workload.

“So the priority for us is we have to ensure that principals and teachers can have teaching and learning as their number one priority. The government department is there to support that.”

All levels of government are developing strategies to address the teacher shortage across Australia.

Ms Car said principals should also be inspiring their students to enter teaching from as early as Year 10.

And the government will also look at ways to make housing more affordable for teachers and other “vital” frontline workers, be it help in purchasing a home or rental assistance.

“We are showing that as a government we are pretty brave and committed to the housing challenge and I think that between the premier the ministers responsible, there’d be a willingness to really look at something like that,” she said.

“There’s a number of ways you could do it but teachers not being able to afford to live in Sydney is not acceptable.”

Despite the challenge, the minister said there had been a strong change in mood and morale over the past year following the election of the new government, a landmark pay rise and the launch of the Telegraph’s unprecedented Best in Class/Australia’s Best Teacher campaign.

“I think teachers are finally feeling like the issues they’ve been screaming about for years are starting to be heard,” she said.

“So there are green shoots, but there’s still a lot of stuff to do.”

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Originally published as Artificial intelligence to be used to ease NSW teachers’ workload