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Made in Europe: The AI company aiming to solve the teacher shortage crisis
euronews (in English)
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23/04/2024
21st Century Digital Teaching (21C) has developed avatar teachers to create new generation mathematics content in a bid to assist schools and boost engagement with pupils.
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00:00
Alan Judd, Chair of 21st Century Digital Teaching and Martin Herschowski, Chief Operating Officer
00:06
at 21st Century Digital Teaching as well. Pleasure to have you both with us on Euronews.
00:12
Now, first of all, you're both behind a new AI company aiming to transform the education system.
00:19
So firstly, can you just tell us about how it started and how it exactly works?
00:25
Well, it started in 19... in 2021 and it started with... I was approached by a headmaster and a very
00:34
forward-looking man, Sir Greg Martin, who asked me to... how could I build a technology platform
00:42
that is going to cure the fundamental shortage of maths teachers? That's how it started. And
00:48
then it moved on to the next generation of personalised learning and then Martin joined me
00:55
and he has single-handed changed the whole... the way digital teaching has really arisen out in the
01:03
UK, I think. And Martin, how exactly have you developed the technology behind this? Can you
01:08
just explain exactly what it does? Well, I think it is, first of all, it's designed by teachers
01:14
for teachers, but the technology behind this is obviously utilising artificial intelligence to
01:21
make sure that the platform can mimic one-to-one tutoring. That's our aim, just to help teachers
01:28
get the better insights about their pupils' performance and then as well make sure that
01:33
each pupil can get the best possible resources to superb their skills. And how does the AI work?
01:41
What is the AI element? Like, how does it... I know it's a very vague term that everyone seems
01:46
to be really abusing these days without really truly understanding it, but I think where AI
01:52
comes to play in the 21st century is we're utilising AI to create the content. So that's
01:58
the initial element where we use AI and we actually had to build our own chat or our own translator
02:06
to be able to translate the lessons that we're getting from our teachers and convert them into
02:12
short and snappy format that is now easily digestible by teenagers. So that's the first
02:17
part where we utilise AI. Then another part where we utilise AI is to be able to track performance
02:24
of every individual student and provide them with the correct and appropriate guidelines
02:29
on what to do next. Okay, so teachers sort of on video, on camera, as well as then the data
02:34
analytics is the... Yes, although we don't really use teachers. We use teachers because we digitise
02:41
them, we translate them into avatars and then they're being available on the screen as digital
02:48
teachers. Okay, so you've used, you've developed avatars to teach the lessons and that's the...
02:52
Yes, that's correct. And that's there too because there's a shortage of teachers,
02:57
real teachers, there's a shortage because the school population is expanding very fast
03:04
and the experience of math teachers is declining because people are retiring,
03:08
they're ill, they're moving, they're going to different places. So to have one-to-one teaching,
03:16
that is really behind 21st century. And as well what's important is obviously that attention
03:21
span of teenagers is really shortening. So we wanted to have our lessons to be as short as
03:27
possible. So instead of 20, 40 minutes long, we have concentrated them into four to five minutes
03:33
format just to make sure that this is something that resonates with teenagers. And that was quite
03:38
a challenge to really compress those lessons into a short format that teenagers can understand and
03:47
they will not get bored. And how long has it taken you? I'm just very interested with these AI
03:53
companies and obviously AI is now very present in industry, everyone is coming up with AI solutions,
04:01
but this has not come out of nowhere. How long did it take to build these avatars and develop
04:06
this technology? Initially when we started or where the company actually started, we haven't
04:12
even been planning to use avatars because that was something that was not entirely possible at the
04:17
time. The concept came up about two years ago that this will be something that we can accommodate
04:23
that will simplify the workflow, that will make this far more engaging and interesting to students.
04:31
And then probably about a year and a half it took us to really train the machine to make sure that
04:38
our content generator is really able to provide the right content. Because the main challenge
04:45
with avatars was not just to create avatars that will look technically correct, but avatars that
04:51
will be able to tell engaging stories. And voice, tone, editorial tone. And I can imagine that being
04:58
incredibly challenging. It has. It has, it has, it has. But obviously as that opportunity
05:05
arise that we can use avatars, we pursue that idea because obviously there is enough research
05:11
on the market that suggests when there is a good link between the teacher and the student,
05:17
then with the same content you can achieve far better results. So that's why our students will
05:23
have an opportunity to choose their favourite teacher. So you're working with teachers,
05:28
are the teachers the avatars or how are you, are you working with teachers to create the
05:34
technology platform? Yes, we work with the teachers to create the curriculum. And the
05:40
entire curriculum was crafted by our head of maths, James Rossiter. He's an amazing mathematician with
05:47
very good credentials in transforming schools that are not performing really well into schools that
05:54
are doing rather good. So we basically using his methodology to deliver something that we know
06:01
works. So I think that's as well one of the differentiation between other platforms and us.
06:08
We have a content that I believe is fully proven. And by the fact that we're using avatars,
06:13
we can easily translate that content into different languages, or we can easily adjust
06:17
the curriculum as well to cater not just for English GCSE, but we can cater as well for other
06:24
European markets. So at the moment, is it you said English GCSE. So is this application at the moment
06:29
just in schools in England? Can it just be used for? So yes, so the current curriculum supports
06:36
English GCSE as well as international GCSE curriculum. So international GCSE is currently
06:43
being rolled out in over 150 countries across obviously, Europe and the world, all the
06:49
international British schools can use the platform. But our primary focus, obviously, at this stage
06:55
is UK because we want to prove the concept, we want to see how everything works and then roll out
07:00
this to other territories. But because as well, we use AI, we use avatars, it is very easy for us to
07:08
adjust the curriculum to, for example, match requirements in Germany, Belgium, Spain. So
07:15
pretty much the sky's the limit at this stage. And what about competition at the moment with other
07:22
AI teaching apps? Is there? I think one of the factors that has been in the back of my mind as I'm
07:30
more an investor in the finance here is to make sure that this product is affordable,
07:37
because AI can be enormously expensive, and then the state schools or schools can't afford the
07:43
product. So that's why we've kind of built our technology in three different domains in the world
07:51
to keep the costs under control, and to make sure that we can deliver a product and system to a UK
07:58
state school that is affordable, but where the output is better than the competition.
08:04
And I'm very interested to know, because you're a UK European startup based startup,
08:11
there have been so many UK and European companies leaving the continent in favour of US exchanges,
08:19
because of the deeper pool of capital, many CEOs that I've spoken to, have said this is the reason.
08:25
What is the challenge, would you say as a startup in Europe, with raising capital compared to the
08:33
US market? Is the US market even something you're interested in? Of course. And we intend to go into
08:38
the US market probably 2025. It'll take about six to nine months to prepare the curriculum,
08:46
based upon the platform we have, which is versatile, and can actually accommodate
08:52
other languages and other systems. I find the UK venture capital market very difficult.
08:59
I don't personally think they're venture capitalists. I think they just bridge fund things.
09:05
We're going into the American, because the Americans are so much more positive
09:09
about how they look at things. The English tend to look at how much are we going to lose,
09:13
and the Americans think how much are we going to make. And their psychology is deeply inground
09:20
in the UK. That's very interesting you say that. So do you think that might be one of the reasons
09:25
why so many other companies are turning to the US? Yes, of course. Because there's more opportunity?
09:31
I think it's deep into the psychology of the British, and maybe the European,
09:36
is not to take a risk. It's really hard to do anything pre-revenue at this stage.
09:41
But if you look at the major companies that have been successful, the investments have always come
09:47
in pre-revenue. Take Uber or someone like that. It's always been pre-revenue. And what other
09:54
challenges have you had getting things up and running as a UK European startup?
09:59
Finance. That comes right back to it. We have the skill sets, we have the people,
10:05
we know the marketplace, and I think I see lots of institutions, and it's the same question every
10:14
time. How many licenses have you sold? Now I appreciate that people want proof of concept,
10:19
but there's also a value proposition. We have finished the technology at a price that everybody
10:26
can afford. The teachers, the VCs, everybody. But there's still, you just have to push them a little
10:32
bit. Sometimes you get success, and most of our funding has come from high net worth investors
10:38
who have got, they're open-minded, they make decisions, and I think they're a great bunch
10:44
of people, the UK private investment market. That's very interesting. So the company has been,
10:52
the money raised has been all private investment. Absolutely. And so for venture capital,
10:57
for startups watching this, and considering or trying to raise money themselves for their own
11:04
company and turning to European VCs, venture capitalists, so you say that's a huge challenge
11:10
at the moment then? I think it's a huge challenge for all startups, unless you're kind of selling
11:16
bread and butter to a bakery. Yes. Now any big dot-com can really happen in Europe because of
11:24
this hesitation from VCs that they're just afraid to take a risk. Very interesting insights there
11:29
from both of you, and thank you for sharing the story of 21C, and we'll certainly be keeping up
11:34
to date on your progress as you go through the journey. So thank you very much for joining us.
11:41
Thank you so much.
11:43
[BLANK_AUDIO]
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