In recent years, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has focused more on how it can improve education, especially in the areas of grading and assessment. Many teachers benefit from Automated Essay Grading (AEG) because it uses AI technology, which promises decreased workload, instant feedback, and higher grading consistency. As AI continues to develop, one crucial question remains: will teachers ever be replaced in the capacity of an essay grader, or is there always going to be a need for a human mark evaluator?
How AI-Powered Essay Grading Works
AI essay grading systems utilize Natural Language Processing (NLP) and machine learning to grade students and assess them based on grammar, structure, coherence, and articulation of ideas. Such systems generate automated scores as well as positive and negative feedback to the flagged students’ responses by comparing essays with trillions of assignments that have already been marked.
Some of the more popular ones include:
- Grammarly- Offers suggestions on grammar, clarity, and completeness.
- Turnitin’s Gradescope- AI tool which helps teachers with grading of essays.
- ETS e-rater- AI tool that runs as an application in standardized tests and grades the quality of an essay.
Advantages of AI in Essay Grading
1. Speed & Efficiency
For a teacher, grading an essay is a gargantuan task, more so if the teacher has a big class. The grading system powered with artificial intelligence can check hundreds of essays in a few minutes, which means the feedback will reach the students at a record speed.
2. Integrity & Less Relative Error
Stray human assessors may show stylistic or systematic bias as a result of tiredness or inaccurate evaluation, but AI systems use fixed parameters as filters to mark objectively without favoritism across all markings.
3. Immediate Response Facilitated by Technology for Learners
Instead, students can receive suggestions about grammar, sentence structure, and useful content for their work in progress. The rewriting process can be completed instantly with an AI tool at any point during the writing process. Feedback need not be received after days of assignment completion.
4. Saves Money
An AI mediated marking or grading system will save a lot of time that would otherwise go into administrative work. These savings in time could be redirected towards other learning resource provisions in the case of schools and universities.
Problems Linked to Artificial Intelligence Essay Grading System
1. Deficiency in Comprehension
AI cannot pass an essay for critical evaluation, imaginative contemplation, or deep sentiment. While marking, it is possible to evaluate its semantic and structural aspects, but nuanced arguments, wit, and sophisticated reasoning may be beyond its grasp.
2. Grading Prejudice In AI Systems
AI relies on already provided datasets which are assumed to be error free. If these datasets contain biased marking schemes, any AIs trained on these AIs will always mark unfairly.
3. Cannot Offer Personal Insights To A Learner’s Work
Teaching and learning is and should be a comprehensive dialogue with people and technology still being able to control the level of humanity involved. Teachers engage students on inclusive, friendly, and supportive terms that make them achieve unlike AI.
4. Security & Ethical Issues
AI essay grading systems have privacy and security concerns associated with them. Storing and processing essays to improve AI accuracy can pose a security risk, potentially making sensitive student data vulnerable.
Will Human Based Grading Become Outdated?
AI is likely to become very useful for performance analysis , but it is not accurate to assume it will completely take over for teachers when it comes to grading writing assignments. There’s going to be a shift towards AI-assisted grading, where teachers’ workloads are eased by having the students’ work pre-scored and commented on by the AI, while the teachers’ focus will shift to advanced-level project analyses, creativity nurturing, and productive interactions with children.
The Future: Synergy Between Humans and AI
A combination of human effort and AI yields the most beneficial results:
- Basic assessments of grammar, spelling and structure will be dealt with using AI.
- Teachers will handle higher level learning skills, such as critical thinking, argument’s quality, and plagiarism detection.
- Teachers will experience reduced fatigue due to AI’s assistance with large volumes of work.
Final Thoughts
AI’s impact on education is changing the system for the better by improving the speed, standardization, and accessibility of performance evaluation. However limited its influence may currently stand in the realm of imagination, arguments, and creative adaptation, it still remains indisputably necessary for the integration of human intellect. AI does not seek to substitute teachers but rather to utilize its boundless potential to increase efficiency in performance assessment while ensuring valuable feedback for students or further engagement in thoughtful endeavors.
