Ed-Tech

Trending Education Technologies & 4 EdTech Areas

Tech is integrated in every aspect of life and education is no exception. One point to bear in mind is that this digitalization will not happen instantly. Educational technology expenditure of 2020 is 3% ($153B) of total education expenditure and is expected to rise only to %5 ($342B) in 2025. As the percentage of technology expenditure in the market is increasing, the market itself is also expanding. In 2025, it is expected that there will be half billion more students. There are of course various fields in ed-tech and most influential four trends will be discussed in this article.

Immersive Learning, AR/VR Technology

Immersive learning is the type of learning that uses possible scenarios and simulations in either virtual or physical environments to teach certain techniques and skills. This learning style puts forward the importance of experience and is a very effective way of lasting effect. It is also highly compatible with real life situations. Immersive learning can be used in a wide range: from kindergarten children to skilled labour.

Investments on AR/VR technology is expected to reach $12.6B in the next five years and most of these expenditures will be made by firms to increase their human capital.

Blockchain

Like in most sectors, data security and reliability in education is utterly important. Blockchain may be useful in credentials, digital certificates and degrees. Gartner found in 2019 that 2% of higher education institutions started using blockchain technologies and %18 will start using them in the upcoming 2 years. Here are the 3 main advantages of blockchain:

  • Security: A copy of the documents will always be available somewhere on the internet, therefore it is almost impossible to lose them.
  • Reliability: Since making changes on every chain that is stored is impossible with true blockchain systems, it creates a verification mechanism that is highly valuable.
  • Productivity: Blockchained documents will eradiate the resume fraud and forgeries. Mismatches in employment due to these problems will cost between $7000 and $50000.

E-Learning

Everyone is aware that the internet is used for information transfer, so it is no surprise that e-learning is a trend. In this field, there are both big e-learning companies such as edX, Coursera, MasterClass and Udemy as well as higher education giants like Harvard, Yale etc. This might seem as if the market is saturated but the reality is far from it. For example, Yuanfudao is a Chinese conglomerate that just closed a funding round with a valuation of $7.5B. This is showing that there is still much demand and room for innovation and improvements.

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Thanks to its wide application range, AI has evolved to be a global trend. Its practicality has made softwares and applications more productive and has cut costs. There are two categories related to education.

Personal Education: Artificial intelligence is increasingly becoming a critical part of personalization and specialization of individual-based learning. It is expected that by 2024, %47 of learning management systems will be AI-Based.

Support to instructors: Instructors, lecturers or coaches mostly have to spend their working time with non-teaching work.

Conclusion

The importance of the education market that is constantly growing and getting more valued is increasing and everlasting. Education technology in all fields is still open to contribution and innovation. With these in mind, it is safe to that this areas will attract more investment in the future.

Ege Yalçınkaya

Hi there, this is Ege, I’m the GM of Sertifier Inc. where we are on a mission to make education accessible for all.

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