Is A.I. the Future of Test Prep? – The New York Times

“I really liked this because we can just use it at home instead of hiring a tutor,” said Esther Yi, a parent in Georgia who has tried an early version of the platform. She found the R.test analysis particularly powerful. “My 10th grader will definitely benefit from this,” she said.

Oscar Torres, a high school math teacher in Chicago who has tried Riiid’s system, said he liked R.test because it assesses student knowledge in real time without depending on past test scores. “As A.I. develops, I see it becoming a better and stronger resource for us,” he said. “We have to troubleshoot real time as teachers, and A.I. can help us tremendously.”

But the company’s goal remains broader than test prep. Mr. Jang said R.test is part of an effort to collect data and prove its algorithms’ efficacy in other domains. Riiid researchers continue to develop novel architectures and higher-performing A.I. models that can track student behavior, trace student knowledge and select the best content to study at any given time.

“Our algorithms can predict with startling accuracy student test scores, a moving number that serves as a sort of carrot,” he said. “The more students follow the algorithmic recommendations, the higher their predicted score will climb.”

Mr. Jang believes that soon teaching will no longer be based on guesswork or intuition, but on data. And that may be the company’s biggest challenge: Gathering that data, he added, is the bottleneck because privacy concerns make data collection in schools a complicated issue. (Riiid says that its apps do not collect any personally identifiable information from users.)

To address those concerns, Riiid has helped establish the EdSAFE AI Alliance, a global, cross-sector alliance of companies, nonprofit organizations and education technology associations to develop benchmarks and standards to ensure the safe and responsible use of A.I. in education.