The return of teachers in an AI era

Our teachers must reinstate themselves as the true teachers dedicated to whole-person education.

Yeom Jae-hoThe author, a former president of Korea University, is the president of Taejae University. Wednesday was Teachers’ Day in Korea. When I was an elementary school student, we gave carnations to our teachers on Teachers’ Day, May 15, to show our deep respects for their devotion. Teachers were our role models, and they educated their students just like their own children beyond the boundary of their profession.

Students at an elementary school in Suwon, Gyeonggi, celebrate Teachers’ Day on Wednesday with their homeroom teacher after giving her a carnation and handwritten letters. [YONHAP]

When I was a middle school student, our homeroom teacher taught English. My memories of the teacher still linger. When I felt sick after getting a cold, he asked the school nurse to take care of me just like his own son. During my high school days, discipline was strict. The new school would expel or transfer students who violated rules. One of our teachers complained to the vice principal about the stern guideline, saying, “If education is that simple, who cannot be a teacher?” When I was a graduate school student, my professor showed how to live a life far beyond his teaching profession in academia. I was lucky to have met such great teachers throughout my school days. Without them, I would not have grown into who I am.

But times have changed. Today, students and parents file complaints about teachers with law enforcement authorities on a whim. Sometimes they ridicule their teachers or even wield violence against them. Principals would turn away from such deviations for their own security rather than rushing to defend teachers. The tragic suicide of an elementary school teacher in Seoul last year testifies to the deepening pressure and pains our teachers experience at schools.

Top priority on “knowledge from education” has helped teachers become plain “knowledge deliverers.” In terms of the efficiency of knowledge delivery, instructors at cram schools can be even better. Due to students and parents’ limitless trust in private education, top-caliber instructors at private academies have become the object of envy, as they can earn up to tens of millions of dollars a year. However, cram schools are not meant for genuine education but designed for the efficient delivery of knowledge needed to enter top universities.

Some teachers have been persistently demanding their rights as “education workers” after establishing combatant unions like the Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union. The functional delivery of knowledge tailored for college entrance replaced the whole-person education long ago. Some parents even demand strict discipline from private academies after it vanished in the public education sector.

With the advent of the AI era, we must brood over the meaning of education. As the word “education” suggests, it is about “educing” the potential from individuals — not about injecting knowledge to them. Therefore, teachers have an obligation to foster students’ creativity, communication skills, and ability to cooperate and empathize with others. Without such capabilities, students cannot navigate their future full of uncertainties on their own.

The Education Ministry plans to introduce digital textbooks for English, math and computing at primary, middle and high schools from next year to meet the increasing demands of the times from artificial intelligence. Georgia Tech in the United States has been using Jill Watson — the AI teaching assistant based on IBM’s Watson platform — for its computing classes.

If AI replaces teachers, will teachers’ roles disappear? It won’t. Instead, the replacement only signifies the return of teachers to their original mission of offering whole-person education to students. While AI teaches students in an interactive way, teachers can coach or facilitate its teaching. As students can learn knowledge through AI or online classes, teachers must raise their capability to solve problems or have a debate with peers in the classroom. In that case, the effectiveness of the one-way knowledge delivery at cram schools will reach the limits soon, significantly reducing the gravity of diplomas from top universities because students can get plain knowledge from various sources, and above all, knowledge will not be confined to colleges any longer.

The shocking murder of a girlfriend earlier this month by a medical student who got a perfect CSAT score still reverberates. The tragedy originated with our perfectly unbalanced education system bent on injecting knowledge without any reflection on the true meaning of education. Our teachers must reinstate themselves as the true teachers dedicated to whole-person education. The time has come for our teachers to return to their profession.

Translation by the Korea JoongAng Daily staff.