What Soldiers, Doctors, and Professors Can Teach Us About Artificial Intelligence During COVID-19

Artificial intelligence technology can tell doctors when a scan reveals a tumor, can help the military distinguish between a truck and a school bus as a target, and can answer a high volume of college students' questions. Sectors of our economy such as the military, health care, and higher education are much further along than the K-12 system in incorporating artificial intelligence systems and machine learning into their operations. And many of those uses--even when they are not specifically for education--can spark ideas for applications in K-12 that may be more pertinent than ever imagined. With the coronavirus upending traditional ways of delivering education, AI technologies--which are designed to model human intelligence and solve complex problems--may be able to help with logistical challenges such as busing and classroom social distancing, provide support to overwhelmed teachers, and glean new information about remote learning. AI techniques and systems are "like the internal combustion engine--you can use them to power a lot of different things," said David Danks, a professor of philosophy and psychology at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, who studies cognitive science, machine learning, and how AI affects people.