Navigating the Future of Education with AI - Insights from Angela Connell-Richards

Transcript

Lachy Gray 00:47

We've spoken about AI and learning throughout the year, and specifically back in episode eight. And whether you love or hate it, it will change how we work in a big way. And Karen and I are keen to explore what this could look like. One of the best ways to do that is to speak with people who are using it in their organization. And with clients. And today's guest uses generative AI to teach trainers in RTOS, Angela Connell Richards is the CEO of Vivacity. Australia's number one RTO consultant service and CEO of diversity team trailblazing international outsourcing provider. She is busy and has been working in the training industry for over 20 years. She's owned and operated to successful RTOS or registered training organisations, and has been experimenting with aisense 2022 Welcome, Angela. Thank you could you start by just giving us a brief background on the two businesses that you run?

Angela Connell-Richards 01:53

Yeah, so we've been coaching and consulting to registered training organisations to since 2009. And basically the what we do that's different from a lot of other consultants is we have a mastermind coaching program. We do a lot of training with everyone on the team, so anybody works within the RTO and that's been running very successfully over the last 14 years. The varsity team I launched at the start of this year, and that came about when we I did a survey back in 2019 to our mailing lists asking them what was their biggest problem? And our mailing list is predominantly registered training organisations and they came back and said, I'm money and compliance. We knew were all over compliance but time and money we didn't know what we could do. So we created Vaseline routine, which is to help people to save time and money. And we first started the outsourcing service specifically for registered training organisations that we've now opened it up to all small businesses, because we had a lot of people asking for

Karen Kirton 03:06

excellent. And today we're talking about AI and specifically AI learning. And I feel like every week I'm getting an email from another software platform that's telling me about the wonderful AI that they refer just implemented into their system. And, you know, we're using zoom to record this and we've started the summary today to see what comes out of there. So What trends are you seeing with AI in learning or perhaps more broadly? In the workplace as well?

03:36

We've seen some massive changes. I use chat GPT every single day with everything that I do. And one thing that I've been doing is teaching our clients on how to use chat GPT in the education sector, so things such as writing a training and assessment strategy, doing a delivery plan and writing a PowerPoint, creating course material and content for that as well. But then I've also been getting them into like mid journey and Dalian, Dalian and we're also been looking at how you can use Canva as well, which also has AI technology in there. And what we're seeing Yes, there is so much of the tech that we've already been using where AI has been incorporated and one thing that I'm seeing is if you don't incorporate AI now into your tech, you are going to fall behind just like the ones if you don't use it right now you're going to fall behind.

Karen Kirton 04:38

Yeah, because I think that it's going to become expected isn't it from people that that's part of the technology and and ultimately it should make it cheaper as well. So it'll be more difficult to compete if you don't have that included. Yeah,

04:53

and just so so much time. Yeah. Absolutely.

Lachy Gray 04:58

What did your journey to incorporating AI into your offerings look like?

05:05

So I've always been a ticket. I absolutely love my technology. And I'm always looking at new ways to automate and streamline what we do in our everyday day to day life. So I started playing with it the end of last year and looking at well how can we use it? And then I actually initiated with team, everyone on my team to use it as well in their everyday so we did that very early this year. And we actually at our weekly meetings, got everyone to write down some ideas on the different ways. They're using chat GBT and AI technology and then we'll sharing that as a team. So we're sharing that with the other teams. And as we're doing that we also identified Well, in the training industry, if our clients aren't using it, they're going to fall behind as well. And a lot of our clients were thinking, it's going to be a tool that their students can use to cheat basically, and write all the answers to their assessments. And we had to change their mindset to this isn't just a tool for your students. And if you have that attitude, that's what's going to happen but if you incorporate it, embrace it, teach your students how to use it properly, because it is going to be part of the day to day workplace, then you're going to be on top of all of that and the big thing is training your trainers and assessors on how to use it. And that's what we've been doing. So we did a course on how to write a training and assessment strategy. We also did another one on how to write training materials and PowerPoint presentations. And it's so funny when you deliver it to someone who's never seen it before and their mind is just totally just like whoa, what else has happened. And this year, we delivered a conference on AI and how that's going to impact the education sector. And it came across really, really well. Our every delegate was took away even the speakers took away something new that they didn't know before. And next year, we're already incorporating a lot of our training in how to use AI tech in the education sector. We've partnered with Accelerate database student management system, who also have some great AI tech that they are incorporating as well into their new systems coming out next year. So yeah, very excited about that really sharing my knowledge and helping others to be able to take advantage of it.

Karen Kirton 07:50

I've liked that you mentioned about hey, you're using it every day and you're having your team do the same. So I guess from your perspective, what advantages have you seen for your business and your team like what does good look like when using these tools? Much

08:08

more productive, getting a lot more done a lot quicker. The way I see it is it's a tool that our team can use to work on those tedious tasks and get through it much quicker so that we can focus more time on our clients and doing having conversations quality conversations with our clients. So I've actually found Yeah, the whole team. So this is both companies. So even our outsourcing team, we've taught them how to use it as well. It's been brilliant for our team in the Philippines because they can convert language with they can they use Grammarly every day so they're using that to correct their spelling in their emails in their documentation, and that grammar as well. So it's certainly has increased productivity. How

Karen Kirton 09:01

do you make it so it doesn't sound generic. When you're writing training materials and emails then like, you know, how do you make it sound like a staff member rather than like the robot? Yeah,

09:13

yeah, yep, totally. So because I've been working with particularly chat GPT for quite some time, or you this year. I've actually I've got the paid version. So I've tapped GPT. And with the paid version, you can train it and it retains it, whereas free version doesn't do that. So one thing I do recommend is get the paid version. And then I've built my profile into it. So now I can just jump in and say, write me a bio and it already knows all about both my companies, my background, my podcasts, my courses that I've developed, so it retains that memory of that, and then also putting into it my style. So one of the things that we that I put into chat GPT is that we have a superhero theme. So you might have seen we have that across both of the companies where we have this superhero theme and we've got super the the RTO superhero, and that's now incorporated into everything. So they're superheroes sometimes I have to say, okay, no superhero theme this time. Yeah, turn it down. And then we also put all of our values in there as well. And what's been brilliant about that is now all of our values are incorporated into everything I put through chat GBD so the thing is, we've charged EBT anybody can use it and you can put any type of information in there. But it's the quality of the information that you put in that you're going to get back and it's the quality of what you're doing to train chat. GBT is what you'll get back. So it's an I don't take the first thing I rework and rework and ask another question go a different direction. And it helps that I am a rider anyway. So I have done that in the past. So basically, I'm just training it, how to write the way I want it to run.

Lachy Gray 11:17

I think that's been one of my learnings, as well as having a real conversation with it. And getting very specific. And the language and the word choice is really important in the prompt. So I'm curious what what have you learned so far in your experience with AR and using for education?

11:36

So in the education sector, I've already covered a number of ways that we're already using it. But the way I'm through my research, or what I've done so far, way I see the future in a tech is we're going to have a much better access to personalized training. So with machine learning, we can no teach the machines but we can also put through our training and assessment materials and actually contextualize the answers and the questions that we ask to the learner cohorts so we can get much more defined into being more personalized to the individual student, which we couldn't do on a large scale before because you have so many different student learner types in one classroom, but now we have the ability to be able to go well these are our different learner types, and it's all going to be about the prompts as well. And the prompts that we put in we're going to be able to make that training much more personalized, which means we're going to get much better outcomes when it comes to work placement.

Karen Kirton 12:46

But they also have very positive but if you've come across resistance to the idea of using AI and learning

12:51

I definitely have so a lot of our clients when I first showed them I said I said this a bit earlier as well. They said they thought it was going to be a cheating tool for the students to be able to use but already turned it in have already incorporated AI tech into its software. So Turnitin is a software where you can submit your assessment tools and turn it in we'll review it to identify if there's any plagiarism within that documentation. And they've already included is this machine word so the answers that they received back is this machine learned. So there are you know, we're using technology to fight that technology as well that other people may be using. The other one is privacy and confidentiality. That one's been a big one with using this technology. Where is my information going is other Do other people have access to that knowledge? Now that's the great thing about when you get a paid account, you can actually switch that off so you can flick a switch on chat GBT to say that my information you cannot share it anywhere else. I don't do that because we don't I don't put any private and confidential information in there. I want it to learn as much as it can about the education sector and about what I do. But if I had something that I was working on that was private and confidential, I could just switch that switch, do that work and then switch it back on afterwards. So they're the main ones plagiarism and copyright privacy laws there. They have been the main pushback, and I think we've trainers it's going to be okay, how do I get my head around this new tech is going to be feared the tech is there.

Lachy Gray 14:45

And is there a concern about that it's gonna replace their jobs or part of the jobs as well. existential threat I guess.

14:54

Yeah. So and I've been hearing a lot of this. So everywhere everyone's saying are the robots going to take over? Is AI going to take over? It will if you don't incorporate it into everything you do. I think what will happen? What I foresee is that will be an integral part of everyone's role is that they'll need to use this now. I'll take you back to I've been around in work for a very, very long time. And when I first started working in an office, we had typewriters, we didn't have computers. And when the computers came in, there was a lot of people who said the computers are going to take my job, and they did their computers did take the jobs, and so did the users who knew how to use those computers and in their work. And I saw a lot of people that was made redundant because I learned the tech. I used the tech. They didn't want to learn the tech and they would not use the tech and so they were made redundant, saying when the internet came in and we were using it for no searching everything online. Same Same thing happened there. If you didn't embrace it, you were you fell behind and then you put yourself at risk. So I think everyone and this is where I've been very much vocal about this within the training industries because it's really important. As the leaders in vocational education and training we should be teaching everyone how to incorporate AI tech into everything they do in their day to day job.

Karen Kirton 16:33

That's interesting because I've definitely seen organizations in the media that have banned their employees from using it.

16:43

As University Yeah. So it does make you wonder is, is that actually doing a disservice to their employees by essentially de skilling them from something that's becoming pretty ubiquitous?

16:57

Well, I did say that at first, where they were, in particular universities were blocking that type of technology. is going to be it's going to be near impossible to be able to do that in the future. But then I saw other universities like our local one here in Newcastle, embraced it and and the big thing was was teaching their students how to use it responsibly, and ethically. So it's really the ethics around using this technology, because we're going to be using it in our workplace every day. So let's teach everyone how to use it.

Lachy Gray 17:37

This talks a lot to surface scared we've talked a lot about the positives. How do you think about the potential downsides to API's such as you know, hallucination, misleading responses, copyright infringement, and I guess a lack of transparency as to how those responses been generated?

18:01

Yeah, yeah. Now, everything I put through Jacci PT and what I get out, is not it's not always correct. There are mistakes that are in there. I know my industry sector. I know what I'm talking about. And I think that's the big thing about using this tool like any other tool or technology that is out there. It is really up to the user and what are they inputting in, and not just doing a direct copy and paste out of the system and using that it's really reading and and identifying Well, is this correct? Have they got the right stats? Have you done your own backup research? So actually, when it actually gives you the links, where it got that information from, go to those links, make sure that those links are relevant. Make sure that the information is still valid right now, and is not past information. And really verify everything that you put through the system and use your own intelligence. You've got your experience, you've got your knowledge, use that to actually identify whether this is information that you should be using. One thing that I have found that has had a massive impact, or everywhere in particular, I've noticed that within myself, I've got better at asking quality questions because with quality questions, you get better quality answers.

19:34

Yeah, it's all about you know what goes in, isn't it like that's, that's the case with many technologies. If you're putting rubbish in, you're gonna get rubbish out. So that's, that's right. Yeah, you know, and in the past 12 months, like we've just seen this exploiting, as we were saying, So, what do you think for 12 months from now, what could this look like in the education sector in learning? Do you have some predictions you want to put on record Angela?

20:08

actually went to the big tech conference earlier this year and there was some talk around AI tech and how is that going to impact but I've also done a lot of research myself into, you know, different ways it can impact the education sector. Now, the big thing is, is going to be making sure that we're getting people using it properly and ethically, as I said before, but learning how to how to do that and I think what also needs to happen is getting

20:56

I think the future the next 12 months like we've had some massive change this year already in everything we do. It's going to be another massive change next year because what's happening now as you've mostly seen in the all the tech guys, they've all started incorporating it into their technology and we're getting those released now. There will be a lot more released next year. There are so many apps out there there's so many so much different technology that is out there. I think the hardest thing about all of this is actually working out which is the better tech and yeah and and unfortunately, we're going to go down the old path or VHS or beta. We've got to work out well which one's going to come out on top. But it's going to be the ones that are more user friendly that is going to be able to be used across a number of different platforms. We're not going to need things like Zapier because the software incorporate those integrations into other software, or you get software that can do everything and it's not just limited to you know certain tasks it can incorporate a lot more. I think the biggest challenge that we're going to have in 2024, particularly in the education sector, is students and trainers adjusting to all of this change. In particular with the trainers. It's how are we going to deliver this training? How do we ensure and this is going to be for the RTOS as well? How do we ensure that the students are learning the skills and knowledge they need in order to be work ready? We already had this as a problem and that's why we've got a skills reform right now and all the VET sector is going through total overhaul. At the moment, we've got new legislation that's coming out we've also got a whole different way of training products and how we deliver our training. So I think the big thing with all that change as well as the AI tech, it's it's that ability to adapt and utilize that to be able to teach the students how to use it themselves. And the other thing is, you're going to have students in the classroom who are going to know way more than the teachers do. And this is going to be in particular in primary school and high school where those students are they're going to go in and go are that knees. I can do it this way. And I just, you know, put these prompts in and I can get it this way and the teacher doesn't understand it. So I think that's where the issues are going to be is to teachers and trainers, the people who are educating are gonna fall behind because they haven't learned the tech. And I think that's what's really important for 2024

Lachy Gray 23:58

It's gonna be a very collaborative environment, isn't it because kids that have grown up with it from our kids, our primary school age, yeah, they will be fact checking everything to teachers saying in real time. I'm probably disagreeing with them. Yeah, so it's gonna force the change.

24:15

Yeah, every child and every adult now has their own personal assistant research assistant.

Karen Kirton 24:21

Yeah, yeah. Well, like I've said before, like my, my kids use Siri much more than I do. And, you know, I had an iPhone before they were born and my son taught me how to do something on my iPhone yesterday that I had no idea. And I said to him, how did you know that? He's like, everyone knows that. It's like, even know where they learned this from. So I guess

24:49

that's because we watch the news, and they watch social media. Yeah. Through social media, and I think that's the thing like, Do you know any person who might be under the age of 25, who actually watches TV or news? Yeah. Like it's very, very rare. If you would not I and I would even say under 30. You wouldn't have that. So the news that we get is very different from the news that they get and there's this short snippets, and it's videos and they're they're consuming those videos. And that's why and I think that's what we need to do as well. And sometimes it can feel like the time wasted, but you do learn a lot from it. And that's where that term. Everyone knows, man. It's online, everyone must know.

Karen Kirton 25:43

Right? I know. I think that's my problem is I ignore social media.

25:50

Yeah, and I think it's most probably got to the stage where we can't ignore social media. We want to keep up with new tech. And so what the new generations what they're learning if we want to keep up with them, they're learning it from social media. So that's where you need to go as well.

Karen Kirton 26:12

Yeah, no, it's a good point. I was looking, McCrindle, who were the social researchers in Australia. They re released some generation reports. A couple of weeks back and yeah, it talks about a generation alpha which is my kids switch. The current generation going through school, and yeah, they learn from each other. They learn from influences. There's no such thing as learning from experts in inverted commas. Yeah, very different world. Yeah.

26:41

Yeah. And the influences are now the nouveau riche. Yes. And there's a reason people following them.

Lachy Gray 26:52

Yeah, that's right. That's what we're that's what society values at the moment so yeah, and, and just follow on question. It was, say in the US with President Biden and his executive order on AI is trying to put take some first steps, I guess, towards criteria for safe and trustworthy AI over there. What do you think government's role is in AI here in Australia?

27:18

So we already have I think it's in Victoria. They've already written legislation for using AI technology in education institutions. So this is primary in high school, not not higher ed at this stage. So it's started that it will happen we will need the legislation in place to protect because you even now you look at we're not protected at the moment from the enormous amount of phising emails that we get, and that's been machine generated now. So we've got all of these these emails that are coming in, like, I feel like half of my emails are coming in. I can't click on a link link because if I do, I'm going to, you know, end up with a Trojan in my, in my system. So So yeah, I think we're that's definitely going to be a change it's going to come through next year is there will be legislation. I think they're still collaborating on that. When it comes to the vet reform in Australia. That's been a massive project that they actually started in 2018. And it got delayed due to COVID. And then it got delayed because we had a change of government and then it got delay because of all this it and how do we adapt to that? So what I foresee it may I know the Victorian Government will be ready for next year. But you'll start seeing it coming out for different in particular in the education sector, but we're going to need it to protect everyone really, because then unfortunately, where there is tech that comes in, there are some great uses for it. And then there are people just take advantage of that. And everyone uses it.

Lachy Gray 29:09

For sure. Well, let's talk about some takeaways from today. I think for me one message I heard from you strongly as I was start experimenting. start experimenting with it regularly. I think both personally and and at work and if if your organization doesn't allow you to advocate for it, because as you start it's going to happen and also verify everything that you're putting through. Don't assume that it's 100% accurate. So see it as a system rather than the whole truth. How about you, Karen?

Karen Kirton 29:44

Yeah, I find it really interesting, especially that you use it every day. And I think that's something that I need to be better at. Like I have definitely played with it and you know, not just touching beauty but other AI but I do need to actually dive into that a bit more. So I did actually wrote myself a note for over summer to actually focus on a little bit more. And also, I just think that idea of don't just take what it gives you and I think that's been my barrier in the past as I kind of just think, oh, yeah, it's just gonna give me that kind of stuff isn't really useful. And so you're actually putting that time and effort into training it, I think is great advice. I'm

30:33

using it every day. It's going to learn more. So and I've got the advantage now because I've been using chat GPT in particular since the end of last year. It's learnt a lot and I bought early so you know, 20 hours a month. I'm paying a research assistant who may be a intern, but $20 a week, a month. It is it's it definitely makes sense. And I've seen people who don't use it compared to me using it, and I'm getting much better results out of it. But yeah, definitely it's the quality

Lachy Gray 31:13

because of anything else we've discussed will be over on our websites. Yeah. no.com Today, you and amplify chart are coming to you just follow the links to the podcast section. And if you receive value from this episode, we'd love it if you could leave a rating or review at Apple podcast or on Spotify and you can catch Angela on LinkedIn.

31:37

Connell Richards you'll find me there. I'm the only one on there.

Karen Kirton 31:41

That makes it easy.

Lachy Gray 31:43

Peasy Bartosik. And we do have a special offer for our podcast listeners over at link tree slash make it work podcast. Episodes are released every two weeks. So click the subscribe button to be notified of when the next episode is available. Any final thoughts, Karen?

Karen Kirton 31:59

No, I just want to say thank you, Angela. Thanks for joining us and for the latest tips and I think if nothing else, if everyone today just starts using it, then you know that's that's further than where we were yesterday. So thanks for coming and joining us and for everyone listening our next episode is actually our last for 2023. We are almost at the end of the year.

Lachy Gray 32:26

Any final thoughts from you, Angela?

32:28

Um, yeah, I think the only thing that I want to push home is embrace the Tech because if you don't embrace the tech, you will fall behind and I've seen it in my career happened to many people who didn't embrace it. And they did fall behind. So if you want to, you know, if you if you're getting ready to retire, then retire.

Karen Kirton 32:53

Maybe check GPT can give some retirement plan ideas.

33:00

Thank you very much for having me on your podcast. It's been a pleasure. Thank you

Lachy Gray 33:05

so much for joining us and we'll see you next time make it work podcast. Thank

Karen Kirton 33:13

you. My stop recording button was there somewhere.

Lachy Gray 33:16

Very good. Thank you. Thank you.

33:19

I think I did share with you my podcast, but on there. I've got a few quite a few episodes on AI tech in the education sector and personalized learning. So what we'll link them in Yeah, so if you wanted to share those links, I'll get the actual episodes for you. Because they relate to what I was talking about.

Karen Kirton 33:44

Awesome. Yeah, feel free to put it into the Google Doc. And then MJ will make sure that they go up on the website. And etc No

33:55

problem. So how many other people do interviewed for this this on this topic

Karen Kirton 34:02

on this topic to be interviewed anyone on AI get uptight remember? So

Lachy Gray 34:08

I'd think so.

Karen Kirton 34:12

Just have a look at the people we've had this year. Now and this year was around AI. So we did talk about AI a couple of times. So we talked about that in May, about how AI can identify skills and how we then trade against them. And then, and then we read machines behaving badly. So we were talking about the ethics of AI Yeah, and I'm pretty sure we talked about somewhere else. I just can't see it on the sheet but it's obviously you know, it's a topic of this year because last Christmas. I know for me every time I saw someone or did anything everyone was like have you used charging Yeah, so it's Yeah, but it's been my theme of 2023 That's for sure. It's just AI like it's like I said it honestly, I've just keep getting emails about now we've got this now I've got this now I got this. Yeah.

35:22

And unfortunately we're getting a lot more spam as well because they use these tick

Karen Kirton 35:28

as getting through the filters. That's what I've said they

35:32

crawling through your website. They're finding your email. I think I've actually got the stage where I feel like I have to take my email address off the website now.

Karen Kirton 35:41

I don't have mine on there. I have like a generic one. But yeah, like it's

35:47

fine to mine's not like displayed you actually have to click on a link next to me on LinkedIn and then they're reaching out there has just been so

Karen Kirton 35:59

I've got contact forms on the website. So I've actually got to click on the Contact fulfilling like click, and they're doing that. So

Lachy Gray 36:05

yeah, that's such an easy machine. And it's

Karen Kirton 36:09

just like, so annoying.

36:14

I have to turn off the phone and just you know I just I don't have some way for comments. Because that's that's the only way they're gonna get through is with the comments. You just have just your standard form because then they won't bother. Because because they can't sell you something on it. One One thing we thought about doing this was Dave, my husband, he thought what we should do is tag them more when they come in, put them into an email campaign. Where they get once they stop stop scamming my page

Lachy Gray 37:00

scammer Yeah,

Karen Kirton 37:02

that's right. They're all the same. Like I just went to my junk mail like you know, impressive profile. It's like three different people's names you get top rankings follow up times, right it's like ah, so yeah, I don't actually bother looking at my junk because they'll go in there but I've noticed a lot more coming through. Like getting out of the junk and getting into the inbox somehow. So the problem is,

37:27

is that I don't look at my junk either. And that's where your Google for wit

Lachy Gray 37:35

that's the problem, isn't it? There's so much noise the signal is lost. Yeah, yeah. But SMS and phone as well. I get heaps of scam calls. Yeah, she's out

37:52

legally, the government needs to come in and do something about it. Yeah, yeah.

Lachy Gray 37:57

Because it's it's breaking out traditional communication methods. I screen pretty much every call that I don't know now because most of them are and that's the thing with Yeah, so they want you to leave. It's an automated message. They want you to talk a couple of seconds grab that they've got your voice. use that against you. A psych it's very challenging. Yeah, yeah. To Yeah, navigate

38:25

I don't if I don't have the number in my phone. I don't answer. Yeah. You gotta file and then I'll listen to the voicemail and then decide whether I'm gonna ring back on or off.

Karen Kirton 38:35

I'm like, I know, it's spam because they don't leave voicemail messages, right? That's correct. So I was actually thinking this the other day, I should put on my voicemail, I do not return missed calls. So I just assume that it's spam. So you actually want me to call you back? Actually a message? Because I had someone say to me, oh, you know, I thought you'd just see the missed call. It's like yeah, but I get so many of them. I just I ignore them. So even for people I know because they you know, fake the numbers as well. So you think that it's someone that you know, it's comes up with their name or their phone number, but it's fake. So, yeah, yeah.

39:21

I'm sure we'll find some software that will block all that eventually, with machine learning. As I said, they, yes, there'll be people who will create all this software that you