AI and ML yield multiple benefits

The research, How Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are Transforming Research and Education, found that:

93% of IT managers surveyed in the education sector and 97% of IT managers surveyed in the research sector said they plan to introduce AI and ML at work. 

78% of IT managers surveyed in the research sector agree AI and ML have impacted the way of doing research, and 74% of IT managers surveyed in the education sector agree AI AND ML have impacted the way of teaching.

"Post-pandemic AI and ML adoption by universities has increased manifolds. 97% of research sector IT managers have introduced or plan to introduce AI and ML at work. The trend has led to increased cloud adoption," says Mahesh Desai, Vice President of EMEA. "AI and ML are increasingly important for research and universities today, and by adopting cloud technology, the research and education community will increase their pace of innovation for their digital transformations."

Methods leveraging AI or ML

The research found that in the education sector, half of the respondents use AI or ML to transcribe online lectures, conduct exams remotely, and enable distant learning. In addition, over a third of respondents leverage AI or ML for proctoring and assessment. 

Similarly, in the research sector, respondents are most likely to use AI or ML for Security Screening or Fraud Errors, Sentiment Analysis, Predictive Recommendations, and to speed up research. In addition, the use of AI and ML is also found in IoT and Device Management, operations like Fault Detection, and increasing accuracy.

Impact of using AI and ML 

The significant impact of using AI and ML is demonstrated in that almost 78% of IT managers surveyed in the research sector agree AI and ML have impacted the way of doing research. Next, the impact of AI and ML is also seen in the education sector, as almost 74% of IT managers surveyed in the education sector agree AI and ML have impacted the way of teaching.

Benefits of AI and ML

There is an overwhelming agreement among respondents that AI and ML can benefit or are already benefitting their organization, as all IT managers surveyed from the research sector (100%) and education sector (100%) said there is at least one aspect that can help their organization that or is currently helped by AI and ML. Looking specifically at respondents in the research sector said improving accuracy through error reduction and improving the speed and scale of their research could be helped or is already helped by AI and ML in their organization.

Next, for respondents in the education sector, the data shows half of these respondents said AI and ML could help or are already helping the quality of learning materials and instructions in their organization. In addition, AI and ML are also assisting this sector by giving more equal opportunities (e.g., through distance learning and saving time and resources for students). Lastly, AI and ML could help or are already helping their organization by saving time and resources for faculty.  

Barriers to implementing AI and ML

The research found that lack of budget is the most common barrier for IT managers surveyed in the education sector, preventing them from leveraging AI and ML; this is followed by a lack of resources and not feeling it would be beneficial/ no use case for using AI and ML. Like the education sector, respondents from the research sector also say they need more budget to leverage AI and ML. A lack of skills closely follows this, and stakeholders must be aware of the benefits and other vital factors preventing them from using AI and ML.

Rackspace Technology is the AWS contract partner in 39 countries in the OCRE framework - the Open Cloud for Research Environments, an EU-compliant procurement framework established by GÉANT- a pan-European research internet interconnection network - and supported by the National Regional Education Network (NREN) in each country. With AWS services, research and universities can accelerate the delivery of their public cloud initiatives by leveraging AI, machine learning, high-throughput computing (HTC), and high-performance computing (HPC).