How will predictive analytics impact the future of education?

Edsembli helps education organizations streamline processes and better manage student data. Schools using our platform already have a wealth of information that enables data-driven decisions and supports student learning. As a result, it’s never been easier for educators to understand the current state of their classrooms and individual students.

Yet, we see data becoming an even more powerful tool to improve student learning. Predictive analytics has the potential to help educators better support students by imagining the future.

Predictive analytics is powered by artificial intelligence (AI) and aims to predict future results by evaluating the past. It’s an exciting new technology already adopted in dozens of industries, and we believe it has tremendous potential to improve education.

How can predictive analytics change education? And what exactly does it do? Read on to learn more about this transformation technology and how we see it taking education management to the next level.

What Exactly is Predictive Analytics?

Predictive analytics is a general term for any software that leverages artificial intelligence (AI) to predict future outcomes. Regardless of its exact usage, predictive analytics looks at historical data and current trends to estimate future results.

This emerging technology has endless possibilities, ranging from predicting the weather to assessing investments. Predictive analytics has already been used in countless industries and has become a valuable tool for many data-heavy platforms.

Is education the next industry to benefit from predictive analytics? We believe this technology has the potential to take your data even further to help students succeed.

The Data Problem in Education

You generate data to predict the future throughout your daily life. Everything from social media platforms to music apps gathers data about you as you use them, then put it to work to serve ads you might click or suggest songs you might like — that’s predictive analytics in action.

You’re then connected with helpful products and discover new artists, both of which you may have never found otherwise.

But what about education? Schools generate meaningful and actionable data, but are we getting the most out of it?

Overall, education is lagging in collecting and harnessing data. Unfortunately, too many districts still rely on spreadsheets and disconnected systems. This makes it nearly impossible to gain valuable insights into the current state of a classroom, let alone predict its future.

The world of education is only beginning to understand data’s power to improve student success. Now that we’ve created a central home for all your systems, data aggregation paves the way for predictive analytics to plug into education management platforms, analyze data, and estimate the future with a focus on improving student learning and performance.

How We Envision Predictive Analytics Evolving Education

Predictive analytics has significant potential to help educators and administrators gain deeper insights from their data. We’re excited to see and participate in how this transformative technology can help the education industry.

How can this new technology improve education? There are seemingly endless possibilities — let’s explore a few powerful use cases.

Provide Adaptive Learning Insights

What if your education management software gave alerts when the class is struggling with a specific topic and how it may impact future success? Educators wouldn’t need to pour over spreadsheets of scores to discover problem areas —  the software would do the heavy lifting.

From there, educators can decide to revisit challenging topics or elaborate on them alongside upcoming lessons.

What if an individual student is struggling with a topic, but the rest of the class isn’t? The software could make you aware of the issue and make suggestions, such as hiring a tutor.

Adaptive learning continuously analyzes homework, quizzes, and test scores to identify challenging topics, then helps educators strengthen these topics. This potential feature would ensure students have a strong understanding of important concepts before moving on.

Build Comprehensive Student Profiles

Our education software already provides robust student profiles by aggregating available data and providing real-time insights. And we think student profiles can go even further.

Predictive analytics can potentially estimate if a student is at risk of a failing grade or low attendance may result in failing the grade level — before it happens. Theoretically, the software could analyze overall trends, attendance, and test scores to identify potential issues.

It’s unreasonable to expect even experienced educators to identify the subtle patterns in test scores and attendance reports. But comprehensive profiles with every available data point can help find problems before they occur and alert administrators or educators to provide extra support to prevent them.

Attendance Management and Grade Forecasting

If a student misses too many days, predictive analytics could alert you that the student will likely finish the year with a specific, possibly failing, grade.

How is this possible? The software could leverage outside research and publicly available data indicating a student may end up with a specific grade if they miss a certain number of days.

This information can help educators communicate with parents to cut down on absences. Additionally, tutors and additional support can be provided to prevent failing grades and make up for significant absences.

Is Predictive Analytics the Future of Education Software?

Our goal is to support educators so that they can enhance student learning. Predictive analytics advances our mission, and we fully support this emerging technology.

Education management software has already greatly improved student learning and success. We see grade forecasting, robust student profiles, and adaptive learning taking education software even further.

The Edsembli ecosystem already improves administrative processes, creates a central home for vital data, and provides actionable insights. Ready to discover how our platform can help your school district? Contact us today to speak with an education management expert to learn more.