• Microsoft Asia and IDCAsia/Pacific today unveiled the latest findings for the study, "Future-ReadySkills: Assessing APAC Education Sector's Use of AI" to Education leaders atthe Asian Summit on Education and Skills (ASES)
• Institutions today thathave implemented AI in their processes expect to see close to 4 times increasedfunding by 2021
• However, only 32% of highereducation institutions have embarked on their AI journey

SINGAPORE - Media OutReach - 23 September2019 - Microsoft Asiaand IDC Asia/Pacific released findings specific to the education sector for thestudy, Future Ready Skills:Assessing APAC Education Sector's Use of AI[1], whereit found that Artificial Intelligence (AI) will help double the rate ofinnovation improvements for higher education institutions.

With studentoutcomes being a key performance metric for higher education institutes, manyare turning to leverage data to glean insights and drive improved outcomes."For many institutions, student performance has a direct impact on rankings. AIcan be a tool to help better manage outcomes and ensure continued innovation tooptimize operations and enhance student engagements, as it reduces resourceintensive work among faculty and administrative staff," said Larry Nelson, RegionalGeneral Manager -- Education, Microsoft Asia.

"In fact, wefound that 3 out 4 education leaders agree that AI will be able to drivecompetitiveness in the next 3 years. However, only 32% of educationinstitutions in Asia Pacific have embarked on their AI journey," added Nelson.

Based on the study, the top businessdrivers for education leaders to adopt AI include better student engagement,higher funding, and accelerated innovation. For institutions that have adoptedAI, they are already seeing improvements in the range of 11% to 28% today inareas such as higher funding, accelerated innovation, higher competitiveness,improve efficiency and better student engagement. By 2021, educationinstitutions with AI stand to experience the biggest jump in higherfunding, which is expected to increase by 3.7x, higher than most industrysectors in Asia Pacific.

Fig 1: AI improves businesstoday and in three years

Developing a globallyengaged citizenry is of utmost importance for all countries and is also one ofJapan's key priorities. However, many students would avoid these opportunitiesas doing so can delay them from taking the classes they need for graduation.  As one of the top universities in Japanserving over 17,000 students, the Faculty of Engineering at Hokkaido University has embarked on its AIjourney as part of its mission to encourage students to study abroad.

In a bid to remove thisobstacle and contribute to a better abroad experience, the university developeda Microsoft Azure-based e-learning system that enables students to keep up withcoursework back home. Leveraging AI and automation capabilities, the systemhelped the university broaden student access, expand capacity, streamlinecourse prep from days to hours, and enhance security -- transforming the abroadlearning experience.

"Our Azure-basede-learning system far better meets the needs of our students, who can accesscourses from PC, Android, iOS, and other devices. This gives them a moreenjoyable and convenient educational experience," said Professor YukinoriKobayashi, Doctor of Engineering and Director of the Graduate School ofEngineering, Hokkaido University.

Asia Pacific's EducationInstitutions Need to Focus on its Strategy and Investment, Culture and Data

The Study evaluated six dimensions contributing to thesector's AI readiness. The educational sector is currently lagging in Data, Strategyand Investment, as well as Culture when compared to Asia Pacific's overall AIreadiness. This signifies that more work needs to be done for these specificareas for educational institutions to remain competitive.

1.    Data: Education institutions need to work onavailability, quality and governance of existing data

Data readiness is a key issue for educationinstitutions. Today, data within higher education institutes is siloed, withlimited usage of a cloud platform for scalability. Institutes also face issueswith data timeliness and quality from sources, and a lack of governancepractices to ensure trust in data usage.

2.    Strategy and Investment: Education institutions needto evaluate investment allocation to support their AI strategy 

For education institutions to reap the benefits of AI,they must have a sound AI strategy in place to help improve their AI readiness.With this, they need to also look at investment strategies that can beallocated to support organization-wide AI efforts.  

3.    Culture: Traits required for AI adoption lacking in educationinstitutions

More than half of the education staff, and nearly halfof the education leaders polled believe that cultural traits and behaviors are not pervasive in their organization today. For example, 67% of staffand 46% of education leaders do not agree that staff are empowered to takerisks, and act with speed and agility within the institution.

"For education institutions to fully harnessthe power of AI, they will need to work on developing an AI strategy which canhelp better integrate AI elements in various areas of the institution. To do so,they will first need to have better data hygiene and work on improving data readiness.Lastly, culture is an important key to help nurture the AI-mindset. Educationleaders will need to develop an innovative culture and empower their staff towork in an agile manner," said Victor Lim, Vice President, Consulting Operations, IDCAsia/Pacific.

AISkills Required for Future of Educational Sector

Both education leaders and staff in theeducation sector are equally positive about AI's impact on jobs. Majority of educationleaders (61%) and staff (61%) believe that AI will either help to do theirexisting jobs better or reduce repetitive tasks. In addition, both areoptimistic of the impact AI will bring to their jobs, with 21% of educationleaders believing that AI will create new jobs while 13% of staff agreeing so.

Fig 2: Perception of AI'simpact on jobs (Management and Staff)

However, according to education leaders,the skills required for an AI future are in shortage. Thetop three skills identified to face a shortage of supply in the next threeyears include:

• IT skills and programming
• Digital skills
• Quantitative, analyticaland statistical skills

TheStudy also noted that there is a disconnect with education leaders' perception of their staff'swillingness to reskill. Although the education leaders realize that there is anurgent need for reskilling efforts in order to cultivate an AI-ready workforce,they are not fully convinced that their staff are committed to being reskilled.Based on the study, 26% of education leaders felt that workers have no interestto reskill, but only 11% of staff had no interest.

"Education management needs to better understand theirstaff and prioritize reskilling efforts to address skills shortage. Only then, arethey able to bring their respective institutions forward into an AI future, andachieve better student outcomes," shared Nelson.

Asian Summit on Education and Skills

These key findings were unveiled at the Asian Summit on Education and Skills (ASES) held in Bangalore, India from 22 -- 24 September 2019.ASES is a leadership and ministerial event dedicated to the education andskills sector, where Microsoft has been the founding partner for its sixeditions.

The annual summit convenes education system leaders,policy makers and key education institution representatives from across Asia todiscuss challenges and opportunities in policy formulation and implementationin the sector. Hosting various sessions of insight and inspiration led byleading education pioneers and experts discussing industry trends and best practices,ASES is attended by senior ministerial delegations and eminent educationleaders from India, and delegates from over 15 countries.

Tolearn about how AI can make a difference in the education sector, visit https://news.microsoft.com/apac/education-asia/

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