Digital education experts joined Activate Learning for a dedicated AI in Education event at Reading College and University Centre on Tuesday, June 25.
The event took place in the college’s South Central Institute of Technology, with around 50 guests joining from Capel Manor College, Christ The King Sixth Forms, City of Portsmouth College, City Lit, Cirencester College, Harrow, Richmond and Uxbridge Colleges, SGS College (South Gloucestershire and Stroud College), The Bedford College Group, Windsor Forest Colleges Group and Yeovil College.
The event was sponsored by JISC, a UK not-for-profit organisation that provides network and IT services and digital resources in support of further and higher education and research, as well as the public sector.
Kim Blanchard, group digital education development manager at Activate Learning, opened the event. Members of the digital education team from Activate Learning then led a presentation titled Activate AI in action.
Paul Zimmerman, group COO and co-founder at Inv Group, then spoke about understanding how AI and tech are changing the way we educate ourselves.
Later, Dan Fairbairn, group executive director – Technology, and Roddy Peters, group head of digital skills from Windsor Forest Colleges Group, delivered a presentation about what took the digital team at Windsor Forest Colleges Group from niche forums to formulating the FE sector’s first Private AI.
Penny Langford, executive head: digital, Milton Keynes College, shared how Milton Keynes College is using AI currently and how they are taking a strategic approach to developing this further.
Representatives from Quizizz, The Blended Learning Consortium, TeacherMatic, The National Centre for AI and Century Tech were on hand to speak to attendees about how their business could help their organisations.
Cheri Ashby, deputy chief executive officer for Activate Learning, said: “I’m really pleased that we’ve been able to host and facilitate this AI in Education event. We believe as thought leaders in the field that it’s really important that we promote opportunities to learn about a how AI is benefiting education.
“We’ve been able to hear from a range of colleagues from different colleges about how they’re using AI to their benefit both from a teaching, learner and group services perspective.”
Kim Blanchard, group digital education development manager at Activate Learning, added: “We’ve had a good mix of speakers from different areas of education and from industry. We’re all thinking about how we want to use AI for teaching, learning, assessment and how we want to empower our learners to be able to use AI ethically and build their confidence in using it.
“It really is the tool of the future, it’s not going to go away, and Activate Learning are well placed to lead that charge.”
Paul Zimmerman, group COO and co-founder at Inv Group, said: “Events like this are absolutely essential, because we’re only at the beginning of this AI journey and we don’t know what students should be taught.
“It’s absolutely essential to pull people, educational leaders, together and get them in a room and talk about these subjects.”
Dan Fairbairn, group executive director – technology, at Windsor Forest Colleges Group said: “We think that as a sector we need to share more, and these events are key to starting this dialogue in the education community.”
Roddy Peters, group head of digital skills, at Windsor Forest Colleges Group said: “There’s a lot of like-minded people here who have grabbed the bull by the horns and it’s great to be in a room with other people who are finding new ways to harness the power of AI.”
Penny Langford, executive head: digital, Milton Keynes College, said: “The takeaway is that we can all think about AI strategically to make sure that, particularly, our senior leadership teams understand what it’s all about so that they can make decisions going forward that include AI in an informed way.”
