Schools and universities are back in full swing, and education and technology companies continue to release tools that make the transition smoother -- increasingly using generative artificial intelligence (gen AI). But could they be altering essential parts of the school experience in the process?
On Monday, Adobe announced a "deeply discounted yet fully featured" subscription to Acrobat AI Assistant for just $2 a month. In the release, the company -- acknowledging the information overload faced by many students today -- said the AI assistant is designed to "transform thousands of pages into insights they can use."
Also: The 5 best Linux distributions for students - from middle school to college
Adobe already maintains Adobe Express for Education, a free K-12 AI tool for the classroom aimed at nurturing creativity.
The company hopes the discounted AI assistant can help students "spend less time searching" by focusing their study time. Acrobat AI Assistant's summarizing feature turns dense documentats into outlines, and students can ask it to synthesize information in simpler terms. The assistant -- available across all desktop, laptop, and mobile devices -- provides clickable citations so students can verify AI-generated information within the documents themselves.
Adobe also mentioned a cross-platform file conversion capability that "makes it simple to gather insights across multiple readings and documents" in PDF, Word and PowerPoint formats, which can aid in creating study guides by organizing "key themes, definitions, dates or other thematic elements so students can review and learn the material in ways that are most effective for them."
Also: 5 ways college students can use Gemini AI to keep up with school work
During exam prep, students can test their knowledge by asking the assistant to generate questions and sample flashcards. For a presentation, Adobe said, students can "ask Acrobat AI Assistant what questions their professor or peers may have so they can practice thoughtful responses."
Still to come is a "two-way voice interaction feature" that enables students to converse naturally with the assistant about material, though Adobe didn't specify a release date.
Concurrent with the announcement, the company reiterated its responsible AI tenets, including that it does not use student documents or other customer data to train its models and that all Acrobat AI Assistant features have been tested against its "AI ethics governance process."
Across the country, many higher ed professionals have embraced AI -- with guardrails -- as a part of the education experience. After initial hesitation, the shift toward acceptance has been buoyed by AI giants like OpenAI tailoring versions of their products for academic environments and even partnering with institutions.
Also: AI 'won't replace' creative skills, study finds
Of course, there's something to be said for the academic value of mucking through a tough reading. Speaking both as a former student and teaching assistant, I find that interpreting and even misunderstanding a text are important parts of the learning experience and can help develop a student's unique perspective.
Adobe says Acrobat AI Assistant can make it "easier for students to find what they need so they can spend more time close reading, analyzing and understanding."
As educator and author Leon Furze notes in a blog on the topic, "close reading is the sustained and thoughtful examination of text. It is a way of examining the ambiguities and multiple meanings of a text, and not simply an exercise in comprehension." Furze is pursuing a PhD focused on how gen AI impacts education and writing.
Also: Today's challenge: Working around AI's fuzzy returns and questionable accuracy
Because AI assistants do at least some -- or a version of -- close reading for students by summarizing passages or entire chapters, it's hard to say what ambiguities or multiple meanings they're able to preserve for student interpretation. Their presumed efficacy also assumes a lot of trust in the models underpinning these summarization tools. Even with attributions, students don't have much insight into how complete the resulting outlines are, especially given that the outlines themselves can be subjective.
That said, AI tools like this can also be viewed as a potential accessbility tool. With ADHD diagnoses on the rise among children and adults, this technology could help engage students who might otherwise struggle with a long reading.