Delivering Accessible Learning Experiences: Avallain’s Inclusive Design Approach

Posted on June 26, 2025July 2, 2025 by Miguel Rivera

As the European Accessibility Act (EAA) deadline approaches, organisations delivering digital education must take decisive steps to ensure inclusivity. At Avallain, we’ve built accessibility into the core of our technology, empowering publishers, institutions and teachers to reach every learner, regardless of ability or context.

Delivering Accessible Learning Experiences: Avallain’s Inclusive Design Approach

St. Gallen, June 2025—The European Accessibility Act (EAA) will come into force on 28th June 2025, and educational organisations across the EU are preparing to meet a new legal standard for digital inclusion. For those offering digital education, this moment brings both the challenge of ensuring compliance and the opportunity to enable broader, fairer participation by removing barriers to participation.

At Avallain, we believe the long-standing commitment to accessibility should be guided by more than regulations. It reflects the belief that digital education should empower all learners. Through expert partnerships, rigorous audits and accessibility-first product design, we aim to enable the educational sector to meet and exceed the expectations set by the EAA.

Accessibility by Design: Supporting Legal Compliance and Learner Success

The EAA harmonises European accessibility requirements for a wide range of digital services, including e-learning content and platforms. Digital education tools must meet recognised standards such as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 AA.

Rather than viewing these requirements as a constraint, publishers and institutions can embrace them as a framework to deliver more inclusive, effective learning. Avallain’s accessibility strategy enables our partners to:

Reach broader audiences, including learners with disabilities and those using assistive technologies.
Increase platform usability and content clarity for all learners.
Build trust and credibility in competitive, regulated markets.

By integrating accessibility into every layer of our technology stack, we make compliance achievable and meaningful.

Avallain Author: Creating Accessible Content with Confidence

Avallain Author empowers education providers to develop digital content that meets the highest accessibility standards. Our built-in features allow content teams to create inclusive learning experiences at scale, without additional overhead.

Key capabilities include:

Keyboard and screen reader compatibility, enabling full navigation without a mouse.
AI-generated alt text for all visual elements, helping to support visually impaired learners.
AI-powered transcript and subtitle support for multimedia components.
Customisable layouts that adapt to various learning needs, such as high contrast and font scaling, are supported by Mercury Design Pack’s accessibility features.
Accessibility controls that inform content creators when media assets are compliant or have not met accessibility standards.
A dedicated Accessibility module within the Author Training & Certification course, guiding users through Avallain Author’s accessibility features and how to apply them effectively.

These comprehensive accessibility features ensure that content creators and academic staff can confidently publish content that aligns with WCAG 2.2 AA and is ready for any compliance audit.

Mercury Design Pack: Building Accessibility into Every Interaction

To guarantee accessibility at every touchpoint, Avallain’s Mercury Design Pack, the foundation of our user interface, has been purpose-built for inclusive learning journeys.

Its accessibility features include:

Strict adherence to WCAG 2.2 AA in every design element, from contrast ratios to focus states.
Component-level keyboard accessibility ensures seamless navigation across all interactive elements.
Scalable and readable typography, optimised for users with dyslexia and other reading differences.
Consistent UX behaviours help all learners feel confident and in control, especially those with cognitive challenges.

Critically for content creation, dozens of interactive activity types built with Mercury have already been audited and validated for accessibility. This allows publishers and authors to create rich, engaging learning experiences that are fully aligned with international accessibility standards without requiring any extra adaptation or technical overhead.

Avallain Magnet: Delivering Learning Without Barriers

Accessibility doesn’t stop at content. It must extend to the platforms where learning happens. Avallain Magnet, our out-of-the-box learning management system, ensures every user can engage confidently and independently.

With Avallain Magnet, schools and institutions benefit from:

Full screen reader support across teacher, learner and admin environments.
Colour and spacing customisation options, supporting neurodiverse learners and those with visual impairments.
Consistent keyboard navigation, allowing users to interact with the platform using only the keyboard.

These features are embedded by default, giving schools, institutions and teachers the peace of mind that their digital learning delivery is design-inclusive.

TeacherMatic: Helping Teachers Create Inclusive Materials Instantly

Accessibility must be effortless for individual educators. TeacherMatic, our AI toolkit designed for teachers, integrates accessibility best practices into every generator.

Whether users are creating quizzes, rubrics or complete lesson plans, TeacherMatic includes:

Inclusive activity design, incorporating Bloom’s taxonomy and Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles.
Templates and content that consider learners with dyslexia, ADHD and other learning differences.
Time-saving tools so teachers don’t have to start from scratch and can instead focus on adapting materials for diverse needs.

By embedding inclusive defaults into content creation, TeacherMatic supports educators in safely delivering compliant, learner-centred instruction without the burden of technical know-how.

AI for Accessibility: The Mission of the Avallain Lab and Avallain Intelligence

Beyond compliance, Avallain invests in future-facing developments to expand what accessibility can mean in digital education. We explore how AI can actively support inclusion through our dedicated R&D arm, Avallain Lab, and our responsible AI framework, Avallain Intelligence.

This includes:

Collaborating with accessibility experts such as the Digital Accessibility Centre to evaluate and improve our products.
Embedding accessibility principles into our development cycles to ensure all innovations align with WCAG 2.2 AA standards.
Using AI responsibly to support content creation workflows, such as generating alt text, subtitles and transcripts to enhance media accessibility.

By integrating accessibility into every layer of our technology and development pipeline, we support industry stakeholders to meet evolving standards while staying focused on learner equity and inclusion.

Accessibility Is Everyone’s Future

As the EAA comes into force, accessibility has become a shared priority across the education landscape. For some, it’s a new legal requirement. For others, it’s a long-held value. For all, it’s an opportunity to create learning experiences that are fairer, broader and more impactful.

We believe in supporting publishers, schools, institutions, content creators and teachers in this journey to not just meet a legal standard but to set a new one. When learning is truly accessible, everyone benefits.

Visit our Accessibility page to learn more about Avallain’s approach to accessibility in education and download our latest Accessibility Conformance Report.

About Avallain

At Avallain, we are on a mission to reshape the future of education through technology. We create customisable digital education solutions that empower educators and engage learners around the world. With a focus on accessibility and user-centred design, powered by AI and cutting-edge technology, we strive to make education engaging, effective and inclusive.

Find out more at avallain.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

Avallain and Educate Ventures Research Collaborate to Deliver Robust, Real-World Guidance on Ethical AI in Education

Posted on June 26, 2025June 26, 2025 by Miguel Rivera

‘From The Ground Up’ is a new report and research-based framework designed in line with Avallain Intelligence, our strategy for the responsible use of AI in education, and built with and for educators and institutions.

Avallain and Educate Ventures Research Collaborate to Deliver Robust, Real-World Guidance on Ethical AI in Education

St. Gallen, June 2025 – As generative AI transforms classrooms and educational workflows, clear, actionable ethical standards have never been more urgent. This is the challenge addressed in ‘From the Ground Up: Developing Standard Ethical Guidelines for AI Implementation in Education’, a new report developed by Educate Ventures Research in partnership with Avallain.

Drawing on extensive consultation with educators, multi-academy trusts, developers and policy specialists, the report introduces a practical framework of 12 ethical controls. These are designed to ensure that AI technologies align with educational values, enhance rather than replace human interaction and remain safe, fair and transparent in practice.

Unlike abstract policy statements, ‘From the Ground Up’ bases its guidance in classroom realities and product-level design. It offers publishers, institutions, content service providers and teachers a path forward that combines innovation with integrity.‘Since the beginning, we have believed that education technology must keep the human element at its core. This report reinforces that view by placing the experiences of teachers and learners at the centre of how we build, evaluate and implement AI. Our role is to ensure that innovation never comes at the cost of well-being, agency or trust, but instead strengthens the human connections that make learning meaningful.’ – Ursula Suter and Ignatz Heinz, Co-Founders of Avallain.

Download The Executive Version of The Report

A Framework Informed By The People It Serves

Developed over six months through research, case analysis, and structured stakeholder engagement, the report draws on input from multi-academy trust leaders, expert panels of educators, technologists and AI ethicists.

The result is a framework of 12 ethical controls:

Learning Outcome Alignment
User Agency Preservation
Cultural Sensitivity and Inclusion
Critical Thinking Promotion
Transparent AI Limitations
Adaptive Human Interaction Balance
Impact Measurement Framework
Ethical Use Training and Awareness
Bias Detection and Fairness Assurance
Emotional Intelligence and Well-being Safeguards
Organisational Accountability & Governance
Age-Appropriate & Safe Implementation

Each control includes a definition, challenges, mitigation strategies, implementation guidance and relevance to all key education stakeholders. The result is a practical, structured set of tools, not just principles.

‘This report exemplifies our mission at Educate Ventures Research and Avallain: to bridge the gap between academic research and real-world educational technology. By working closely with teachers, school leaders and developers, we’ve created ethical controls that are both grounded in evidence and practical in use. Our goal is to ensure that AI in education is not only effective, but also transparent, fair and aligned with the human values that define great teaching.’ – Prof. Rose Luckin, CEO of Educate Ventures Research and Avallain Advisory Board Member.

Recommendations That Speak To Real-World Risks

Some of the report’s most relevant insights include:

User Agency Preservation
AI should support, not override, the decisions of teachers and the autonomy of learners. Design should prioritise flexibility and transparency, allowing human control and informed decision-making.

Cultural Sensitivity and Inclusion
The report calls for continuous audits, bias detection and cultural representation in AI training data and outputs, with robust mechanisms for local adaptation.

Transparent AI Limitations
AI systems must explain what they can and cannot do. Visual cues, plain-language disclosures and in-context explanations all help users manage expectations.

Adaptive Human Interaction Balance
The rise of AI must not mean the erosion of dialogue. Thresholds for teacher-student and peer-to-peer interaction should be built into implementation plans, not left to chance.

Impact Measurement Framework
The report calls for combining short-term performance data and long-term qualitative indicators to assess whether AI tools genuinely support learning.

Relevance Across The Education Ecosystem

For Publishers

The report’s recommendations align closely with educational publishers’ strategic goals. Whether using AI to accelerate content production, localise materials, or personalise resources, ethical deployment requires more than efficiency. It requires governance structures that protect against bias, uphold academic rigour and enable human review. Solutions like Avallain Author already embed editorial control into AI-supported workflows, ensuring quality and trust remain paramount.

For Schools And Institutions

From primary schools to higher and vocational education providers, the pressure to adopt AI is growing. The report provides practical guidance on how to do so responsibly. It outlines how to set up oversight mechanisms, train staff, communicate transparently with parents and evaluate long-term impact. For institutions already exploring AI for tutoring or assessment, the controls offer a roadmap to stay aligned with safeguarding, inclusion and pedagogy.

For Content Service Providers

Agencies supporting publishers and ministries with learning design, editorial production and localisation will find clear implications throughout the report. From building inclusive datasets to ensuring transparent output verification, ethical AI becomes a shared responsibility across the value chain. Avallain’s technology, driven by Avallain Intelligence, enables these partners to apply ethical filters and maintain editorial standards at scale.

For Teachers

Educators are frontline decision makers. They shape how AI is used in the classroom. The report explicitly calls for User Agency Preservation to be maintained, Ethical Use Training and Awareness to be prioritised and teacher feedback to guide AI evolution. Solutions within Avallain’s portfolio, such as TeacherMatic, are already embedding these principles by offering editable outputs, contextual prompts and transparency in how each suggestion is generated.

The Role Of Avallain Intelligence: Putting Ethical Controls Into Action

Avallain Intelligence is Avallain’s strategy for the ethical and safe implementation of AI in education and the applied framework that aims to integrate these 12 ethical controls. It adheres to principles such as transparency, fairness, accessibility and agency within the core infrastructure of Avallain’s digital solutions.

This includes:

Explainable interfaces that clarify how AI decisions are made.
Editable content outputs that preserve user control.
Cultural customisation features for inclusive learning contexts.
Bias Detection and Fairness Assurance systems with review mechanisms.
Built-in feedback loops to refine AI based on classroom realities.

Avallain Intelligence was developed to meet and exceed the expectations outlined in ‘From the Ground Up’. This means publishers, teachers, service providers and institutions using Avallain tools are not starting from scratch but are already working within an ecosystem designed for ethical AI.

The work of the Avallain Lab, our in-house academic and pedagogical hub, continuously informs these principles and ensures that every advancement is grounded in research, ethics and real classroom needs.

‘The insights and methodology that underpin this report reflect the foundational work of the Avallain Lab and our commitment to research-led development. By aligning ethical guidance with practical use cases, we ensure that Avallain Intelligence evolves in direct response to real pedagogical needs. This collaboration shows how rigorous academic frameworks can inform responsible AI design and help create tools that are not only innovative but also educationally sound and trustworthy.’ – Carles Vidal, Business Director of the Avallain Lab.

Download The Executive Version

This is a practical roadmap for anyone seeking to navigate the opportunities and risks of AI in education with clarity, confidence and care.

Whether you are a publisher exploring AI-powered content workflows, a school leader integrating new technologies into classrooms or a teacher looking for trusted guidance, ‘From the Ground Up’ offers research-based recommendations you can act on today.

Click here to download the executive version of the report to explore how the 12 ethical controls can help your organisation adopt AI responsibly, support educators, protect learners and remain committed to your educational mission.

About Educate Ventures Research

Educate Ventures Research (EVR) is an innovative boutique consultancy and training provider dedicated to helping education organisations leverage AI to unlock insights, enhance learning and drive positive outcomes and impact.

Its mission is to empower people to use AI safely to learn and thrive. EVR envisions a society in which intelligent, evidence-informed learning tools enable everyone to fulfil their potential, regardless of background, ability or context. Through its research, frameworks and partnerships, EVR continues to shape how AI can serve as a trusted companion in teaching and learning.

Find out more at educateventures.com

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

Thinking about the Edtech Echo Chamber

Posted on June 26, 2025July 2, 2025 by Miguel Rivera

Educational technology is often seen as a straightforward solution to teaching challenges. Yet, beneath the surface lies a complex dynamic. Who ultimately shapes educational technology? This piece explores the proximity between those who buy and sell edtech and the gap between these decision-makers and those who actually use it. This imbalance influences both innovation and pedagogy.

Thinking about the Edtech Echo Chamber

Author: Prof John Traxler, UNESCO Chair, Commonwealth of Learning Chair and Academic Director of the Avallain Lab

Since joining Avallain and whilst continuing to work as a university professor, I have been reflecting on the nature of the edtech environment. My perspective is not only very generalised, subjective and impressionistic. It also overlooks major disturbances, most obviously the global pandemic, the alleged ‘pivot’ to digital learning and the global explosion of artificial intelligence, with its haphazard adoption in education.

Specifically, I have been thinking about the small informal community of people within the organisations of the education sectors who design, develop and sell dedicated edtech systems and other people who buy, install and maintain such systems. On behalf of their respective organisations, they are engaged in transactions that are highly focused, highly technical, highly complex and highly responsible. The members of this informal community, both ‘buyers’ and ‘sellers’, must, by the nature of their enormous expertise, share very similar backgrounds, values, language, ideas and influential personalities in order to be effective. Their experience suggests that in their careers they can change from ‘sellers’ or ‘buyers’ and back again several times.

I suspect that they share a kind of groupthink that seems, certainly in their terms, to be productive, objective and transparent. By this, I mean that the buyers and sellers agree on what they should be discussing (and what not to discuss). This groupthink determines the direction of procurement and consequently focuses on making existing products and systems faster, bigger, cheaper, more secure, more attractive and more compliant, and builds on current perceived successes.

The User Community

There is, however, another informal community involved, on the periphery of the informal edtech buyers and sellers community, namely that of teachers, lecturers, learners and students.

My worry is that because of differences in values, language, ideas and influential personalities, any discourse with these communities of teachers, lecturers, learners or students is much less efficient and effective. It is often perceived as partly mutually incomprehensible, characterised by one community or the other using concepts, methods, tools, values and references not wholly or confidently understood by the other.

As an example, many organisations using educational technology are trying to address equity, inclusion and diversity in their provision and their ethos. They may also be trying to promote different models or strategies for teaching and learning. Whilst the communities of teachers and lecturers know whom to involve to advance these initiatives within their own work, moving upstream and being able to articulate their needs in technically meaningful ways seems generally much more difficult. There is a chasm between ‘academic’ departments, doing the teaching, and ‘service’ departments, running the digital technology.

Obviously, issues like staff retraining, interoperability and managerial nervousness further limit the scope for systemic, as opposed to incremental, change. So do the business models of educational organisations and, for example, of education and academic publishers.

Horizon Scanning

I did consultancy for the UK NHS, National Health Service, some years ago, helping to improve their edtech ‘horizon scanning’ capacity, and whilst it is possible to develop methods and tools for this, I now worry that the problem is the possible inability to break out of the groupthink, out of the accepted views, of the community in question. At the time, I expressed this slightly differently, saying it was easy to see innovations on the horizon coming straight at you, but the challenge was to spot the relevance of those on the horizon, appearing further off to the left or way off to the right. Again, there is a difference between ‘hard’ technical stuff on the horizon and ‘soft’ educational stuff.

There might be a connection between these observations about horizon scanning and other work on tools and methods to support brainstorming, which attempt to generate new ideas within a community as opposed to recognising ideas outside the community and on the horizon.

I might be equating the groupthink of various closed but informal groups with the ideas about paradigms, scientific or otherwise, but in a practical sense, I wondered how we promote the ‘paradigm shifts’ that bring about dramatic but benign or beneficial transformation. In short, where do new products come from?

Breaking the Edtech Echo Chamber

In conclusion, I am attempting to make a case that the people buying and selling educational technology often understand each other much better than they understand the people using it, and thus educational technology is driven by technology push (or technological determinism) rather than pedagogy pull.

I think this builds in some pedagogic conservatism. There might be other reasons or perspectives, but this gap remains a critical challenge.

The future of educational technology depends on breaking down silos and aligning the expertise of buyers and sellers with the lived needs of educators and learners. Together, fostering shared language and values will empower all stakeholders to participate in shaping tools that genuinely enhance education.

¹ Perhaps this current piece could be reworked to address these two issues but I think both have served to reinforce existing attitudes and values, and that pronouncements of systemic transformation may be premature or overstated or misleading.

² But clearly this can only be impressions and could never be based on anything purporting to be ‘scientific’ or ‘objective’.

³ I think in fact I am saying this community articulates and represents a ‘paradigm’ as defined by Thomas S. Kuhn in his 1974 short paper Second Thoughts on Paradigms (available online at https://uomustansiriyah.edu.iq/media/lectures/10/10_2019_02_17!07_45_06_PM.pdf), albeit a modest one compared to Darwinian evolution, heliocentric astronomy or even object-oriented programming.

⁴ There is also a factor understood in requirements engineering about the human incapacity to answer questions about the future; ask customers or users what they would like in the future and they will reply, what they already have but faster. This too builds in conservatism. Fortunately, there are various better techniques to elicit future requirements from customers or users.

⁵ Characterised on one side by fairly generalised, abstract and social ideas and values and on the other by specific, concrete and technical ideas and values, though it is difficult for this characterisation to be objective and neutral.

⁶ It could be the grand ‘connectivist’ conceptions of the early ideologically driven MOOCs or merely flipped learning, self-directed learning, critical digital literacy, project-based learning, situated learning and so on.

⁷ Which might explain why most universities and colleges seem stuck in the digital technology of the 1990s, namely the VLE/LMS and the networked desktop computer, in spite of the ubiquity of social media and personal technologies.

⁸ Defined here as the ability of different hardware and software systems with different roles within a complex organisation to work together.

⁹ ‘Horizon scanning’ is the activity of intercepting and interpreting ideas that are emergent, unformed, unclear and then seeing their practical relevance ahead of colleagues and competitors. There are various methods and for the NHS we attempted to synthesise and validate a method from those already in government departments, universities and corporations.

¹⁰ Thinking of Teflon and Post-Its.

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com

About TeacherMatic

TeacherMatic, a part of the Avallain Group since 2024, is a ready-to-go AI toolkit for teachers that saves hours of lesson preparation by using scores of AI generators to create flexible lesson plans, worksheets, quizzes and more.

Find out more at teachermatic.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

Smarter Content for Every Level: CEFR Adaptation and Alignment with TeacherMatic

Posted on June 26, 2025June 26, 2025 by Miguel Rivera

Explore insights from the latest TeacherMatic Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar with Nik Peachey, during which he demonstrated how AI can streamline CEFR adaptation, support differentiated instruction and make CEFR alignment practical and achievable.

Smarter Content for Every Level: CEFR Adaptation and Alignment with TeacherMatic

London, June 2025 – In the latest TeacherMatic Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar, ‘Adapting Content for Effective CEFR-Aligned Language Teaching’, award-winning educator and edtech consultant Nik Peachey demonstrated how AI can transform the way teachers align content to the CEFR framework. Moderated by Giada Brisotto, Senior Marketing & Sales Operations Manager at Avallain, the session introduced teachers to time-saving tools specifically tailored to language classrooms.

Designing for Language Classrooms, Not Just Outputs

Unlike generic AI tools that produce unpredictable or overly complex content, the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition is built around a core understanding of language teaching workflows. Nik opened the session with an overview of the platform and shared how it was purpose-built for educators:

‘These generators aren’t just text tools. They’re designed with real classroom needs in mind. You input your goals, level and theme, and the results are ready to use or refine.’

Developed in collaboration with educators, the platform includes over 40 AI generators that can adapt reading texts, create scaffolded tasks and provide differentiated resources based on CEFR levels.

Exploring the Generators

To help educators address common challenges, Nik focused the session on two powerful generators:

Adapt Your Content Generator

This generator allows teachers to input and adjust a text to a different CEFR level. It’s beneficial for mixed-ability groups, enabling the creation of simpler or more advanced versions of the same content, without changing the theme.

‘You can take something at B2 and make it work for A2 in seconds, and the results aren’t just accurate. They’re pedagogically useful.’ – Nik Peachey.

CEFR Level Checker

This tool allows teachers to paste or upload text and instantly receive a detailed CEFR analysis. It provides an overall level and a breakdown of linguistic features such as vocabulary and grammar complexity.

‘It’s great for checking the level of materials you’re designing for your students. It can also be used to analyse students’ written work or evaluate authentic texts pulled from the internet.’ – Nik Peachey.

Adapting to Your Students

Nik highlighted the platform’s flexibility as one of its key advantages. Whether dealing with mixed-ability groups or looking to differentiate instruction, you can adapt materials instantly.

‘It’s not just about saving time. It’s about creating something that actually works for your learners faster.’ – Nik Peachey.

Teachers can generate different versions of the same resource for different groups. With just a few clicks, a B1 reading passage can be simplified to A2 or made more challenging for B2 learners.

Built with Teachers in Mind

Unlike general-purpose AI platforms, the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition generators are fine-tuned for language education. Nik explained that the behind-the-scenes work of AI developers ensures consistency and relevance in every output.

The CEFR Level Checker, for instance, has been rigorously tested to provide more accurate results than a generic prompt. This design means less trial and error and more reliable results for teachers pressed for time.

Real Concerns, Real Solutions

Attendees asked about prompt quality, language combinations and how CEFR logic is applied behind the scenes. Nik explained that while CEFR is a flexible framework, the generators have been carefully built around the functional descriptors educators rely on most. Giada added that this work is supported by a collaboration with NILE and CEFR expert Helen Boyd to ensure rigorous alignment that reflects academic best practice.

Nik also encouraged teachers to review outputs with their own learners in mind. The platform is a tool, not a finished product. It empowers educators to shape content, not simply consume it.

Explore the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition

Whether teaching A1 learners or guiding advanced students through C1 material, the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition helps you do it faster, better and more flexibly.

Explore it here

Next in the Webinar Series

Don’t miss the next session of the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Takeoff series, ‘Generate, Engage and Assess: Create Custom Texts and Multiple Choice Quizzes‘:

Date: Thursday, 10th July
Time: 12:00 – 12:30 BST | 13:00 – 13:30 CEST

This session will show you how to use AI to generate engaging texts and effective quiz-based assessments. It is perfect for educators looking to enrich their classrooms with authentic, CEFR-aligned materials in minutes.

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com

About TeacherMatic

Find out more at teachermatic.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

Who Owns ‘Truth’ in the Age of Educational GenAI?

Posted on May 23, 2025June 26, 2025 by Lindsay Dowling

As generative AI becomes more deeply embedded in digital education, it no longer simply delivers knowledge; it shapes it. What counts as truth, and whose truth is represented, becomes increasingly complex. Rather than offering fixed answers, this piece challenges educational technologists to confront the ethical tensions and contextual sensitivities that now define digital learning.

Who Owns ‘Truth’ in the Age of Educational GenAI?

Author: Prof. John Traxler, UNESCO Chair, Commonwealth of Learning Chair and Academic Director of the Avallain Lab

St. Galen, May 23, 2025 – Idealistically, perhaps, teaching and learning are about sharing truths, and sharing facts, values, ideas and opinions. Over the past three decades, digital technology has been increasingly involved or implicated in teaching and learning, and increasingly involved or implicated in shaping the truths, the facts, values, ideas and opinions that are shared. Truth seems increasingly less absolute, stable and reliable and digital technology seems increasingly less neutral and passive.

The emergence of powerful and easily available AI, both inside education and in the societies outside it, only amplifies and accelerates the instabilities and uncertainties around truth, making it far less convincing for educational digital technologists to stand aside, hoping that research or legislation or public opinion will understand the difficulties and make the rules. This piece unpacks these sometimes controversial and uncomfortable propositions, providing no easy answers but perhaps clarifying the questions.

Truth and The Digital

Truth is always tricky. It is getting trickier and trickier, and faster and faster. We trade in truth, we all trade in truth; it is the foundation of our communities and our companies, our relationships and our transactions. It is the basis on which we teach and learn, we understand and we act. And we need to trust it.

The last two decades have, however, seen the phrases ‘fake news’ and ‘post truth’ used to make assertions and counter assertions in public spheres, physical and digital, insidiously reinforcing the notion that truth is subjective, that everyone has their own truth. It just needs to be shouted loudest. These two decades also saw the emergence and visibility of communities, big and small, in social media, able to coalesce around their own specific beliefs, their own truths, some benign, many malign, but all claiming their adherents to be truths.

The digital was conceived ideally as separate and neutral. It was just the plumbing, the pipes and the reservoirs that stored and transferred truths, from custodian or creator to consumers, from teacher to learner. Social media, intrusive, pervasive and universal, changed that, hosting all those different communities.

The following selection of assertions comprises some widely accepted truths, though this will always depend on the community; others are generally recognised as false and some, the most problematic, generate profound disagreement and discomfort.

The moon is blue cheese, the Earth is flat
God exists
Smoking is harmless
The holocaust never happened
Prostate cancer testing is unreliable
Gay marriage is normal
Climate change isn’t real
Evolution is fake
Santa Claus exists
Assisted dying is a valid option
Women and men are equal
The sun will rise
Dangerous adventure sports are character-building
Colonialism was a force for progress

These can all be found on the internet somewhere and all represent the data upon which GenAI is trained as it harvests the world’s digital resources. Whether or not each is conceived as true depends on the community or culture.

Saying, ‘It all depends on what you mean by …’ ignores the fundamental issue, and yes, some may be merely circular while others may allow some prevarication and hair-splitting, but they all exist.

Educational GenAI

In terms of the ethics of educational AI, extreme assertions like the ‘sun will rise’ or ‘the moon is blue cheese’ are not a challenge. If a teacher wants to use educational GenAI tools to produce teaching materials that make such assertions, the response is unequivocal; it is either ‘here are your teaching materials’ or ‘sorry, we can’t support you making that assertion to your pupils’.

Where educational AI needs much more development is in dealing with assertions which, for us, may describe non-controversial truths, such as ‘women and men are equal’ and ‘gay marriage is normal’, but which may be met by different cultures and communities with violently different opinions.

GenAI harvests the world’s digital resources, regurgitating them as plausible, and in doing so, captures all the prejudice, biases, half-truths and fake news already out there in those digital resources. The role of educational GenAI tools is to mediate and moderate these resources in the interests of truth and safety, but we argue that this is not straightforward. If we know more about learners’ culture and contexts and their countries, we are more likely to provide resources with which they are comfortable, even if we are not.

Who Do We Believe?

Unfortunately, some existing authorities that might have helped, guided and adjudicated these questions are less useful than previously. The speed and power of GenAI have overwhelmed and overtaken them.

Regulation and guidance have often mixed pre-existing concerns about data security with assorted general principles and haphazard examples of their application, all focused on education in the education system rather than learning outside it. The education system has, in any case, been distracted by concerns about plagiarism and has not yet addressed the long-term issues of ensuring school-leavers and graduates flourish and prosper in societies and economies where AI is already ubiquitous, pervasive, intrusive and often unnoticed. In any case, the treatment of minority communities or cultures within education systems may itself already be problematic.

Education systems exist within political systems. We have to acknowledge that digital technologies, including educational digital technologies, have become more overtly politicised as global digital corporations and powerful presidents have become more closely aligned.

Meanwhile, the conventional cycle of research funding, delivery, reflection and publication is sluggish compared to developments in GenAI. Opinions and anecdotes in blogs and media have instead filled the appetite for findings, evaluations, judgments and positions. Likewise, the conventional cycle of guidance, training, and regulation is slow, and many of the outputs have been muddled and generalised. Abstract theoretical critiques have not always had a chance to engage with practical experiences and technical developments, often leading to evangelical enthusiasm or apocalyptic predictions.

So, educational technologists working with GenAI may have little adequate guidance or regulation for the foreseeable future.

Why is This Important?

Educational technologists are no longer bystanders, merely supplying and servicing the pipes and reservoirs of education. Educational technologists have become essential intermediaries, bridging the gap between the raw capabilities of GenAI, which are often indiscriminate, and the diverse needs, cultures and communities of learners. Ensuring learners’ safe access to truth is, however, not straightforward since both truth and safety are relative and changeable, and so educational technologists strive to add progressively more sensitivity and safety to truths for learners.

At the Avallain Lab, aligned with Avallain Intelligence, our broader AI strategy, we began a thorough and ongoing programme of building ethics controls that identify what are almost universally agreed to be harmful and unacceptable assertions. We aim to enhance our use of educational GenAI in Avallain systems to represent our core values, while recognising that although principles for trustworthy AI may be universal, the ways they manifest can vary from context to context, posing a challenge for GenAI tools. This issue can be mitigated through human intervention, reinforcing the importance of teachers and educators. Furthermore, GenAI tools must be more responsive to local contexts, a responsibility that lies with AI systems deployers and suppliers. While no solution can fully resolve society’s evolving controversies, we are committed to staying ahead in anticipating and responding to them.

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com

About TeacherMatic

Find out more at teachermatic.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

From Rubrics to Results: Making Feedback More Impactful with AI in Language Teaching

Posted on May 22, 2025June 2, 2025 by Lindsay Dowling

Delivering impactful feedback can be one of the most time-consuming parts of language teaching. In this chapter of the Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar Series, we explored how to streamline the feedback process without compromising the quality that learners deserve.

From Rubrics to Results: Making Feedback More Impactful with AI in Language Teaching

London, May 2025 – On May 15th, the Avallain Group hosted the second session in its Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar Series, ‘From Rubrics to Results: How to Provide Impactful Feedback’. The session was moderated by Giada Brisotto, Senior Marketing and Sales Operations Manager at Avallain, and led by Nik Peachey, educator, author and edtech consultant.

This 30-minute session focused on how the Feedback Generator in the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition can assist educators in providing better, faster and more personalised feedback.

The Challenge: High-Quality Feedback Takes Time

Feedback is essential for student progress, but for teachers, it often comes at the cost of time and energy. Nik opened the session by acknowledging this widespread issue and proposing a practical, AI-supported solution: the Feedback Generator.

Unlike general-purpose tools, the TeacherMatic Feedback Generator, designed specifically for language teaching, allows educators to produce constructive feedback that aligns with assignment briefs, CEFR levels and specific pedagogical approaches.

Personalised Feedback at Scale

Nik demonstrated how the Feedback Generator makes it possible to maintain personalisation, even with large groups of students. By inputting a student’s response and the original task prompt, teachers can instantly generate comments that are:

Aligned with CEFR levels and subscales. (e.g., B1 writing > coherence and cohesion)
Tailored to the assessment criteria or rubric used by the teacher or institution.
Balanced between strengths and areas of improvement.

The result: fast, personalised and pedagogically relevant feedback.

Designed for Language Teachers, Not Just Generic Use

As it is purpose-built for language educators, the Feedback Generator supports core pedagogical models including:

Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)
Task-Based Learning (TBL)
Presentation Practice Production (PPP)
Lexical Approach
Test – Teach – Test

This flexibility allows teachers to generate feedback that fits their existing lesson models and institutional standards.

From Feedback to Feedforward

Nik emphasised that effective feedback not only reflects on the past but also guides learners as they progress. The Feedback Generator enables this by including next steps and actionable guidance in the comments, which can be adjusted for tone, focus and complexity.

This ‘forward approach’ aligns with current thinking in language assessment, that feedback should help students take ownership of their progress and better understand learning objectives.

Why It Matters: Lighter Workload, Deeper Impact

The session closed with a powerful reminder: when tools are designed around the real needs of teachers, not just general AI capabilities, they can genuinely reduce pressure without lowering standards.

By using the Feedback Generator, teachers can:

Save time without sacrificing quality
Ensure consistency in grading
Focus more on student support and less on repetitive admin
Promote deeper engagement with learning goals

What’s Next in the Series?

The Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar Series continues in June with ‘Adapting Content for Effective CEFR-Aligned Language Teaching’. You can reserve your seat now. This is a free webinar, but spaces are limited.

Save the Date:

Thursday, 12th June
12:00 – 12:30 BST | 13:00 – 13:30 CEST

Register now for the webinar

Discover the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition

The Language Teaching Edition of TeacherMatic has been purpose-built to elevate language teaching and learning through sector-specific features designed for real classroom needs. With CEFR-aligned AI generators and support for key pedagogical models such as CLT, Task-Based Learning, PPP and more, it empowers language educators to create high-quality, personalised content efficiently and confidently.

Visit the dedicated landing page to explore all features in depth

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com

About TeacherMatic

Find out more at teachermatic.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

International House World Organisation to Roll Out TeacherMatic Across Global Network

Posted on May 7, 2025May 7, 2025 by Miguel Rivera

After a successful pilot across International House schools, TeacherMatic has been officially adopted as IHWO’s preferred AI toolkit for teachers. Built for real-world classroom needs and developed with a strong ethical foundation through Avallain Intelligence, the platform will now be made available to the entire IH network.

International House World Organisation to Roll Out TeacherMatic Across Global Network

London, 7 May 2025 – After months of hands-on piloting with teachers in its network, International House World Organisation (IHWO) has chosen the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition as its preferred AI toolset for language educators. IHWO is facilitating access to the platform for their affiliate schools through an exclusive offer, providing their teaching teams with AI support that is safe, ethical, intuitive and designed specifically for language education.

Successful Pilot Confirms Teacher Confidence and Classroom Value

The decision follows a carefully structured pilot involving multiple IH schools, during which teachers used TeacherMatic to generate lesson plans, grammar tasks, vocabulary activities, discussion prompts and more.

‘We are thrilled to partner with TeacherMatic to bring their cutting-edge AI generators to the schools in our organisation. This collaboration is about giving our schools access to the latest AI technology, enabling educators to innovate, save time, focus on what matters most and support students’ growth and success.’ – Shaun Wilden, Digital Innovation Advisor, IHWO.

Building on a Foundation of Innovation in Teacher Development

This latest development builds on a wider collaboration between IHWO and Avallain that began when IHWO selected Avallain Magnet alongside Avallain Author to create and deliver high-quality digital teacher training programmes.

With this foundation in place, the adoption of the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition extends the collaboration into the day-to-day reality of the language classroom, offering teachers practical, time-saving AI tools designed to meet the specific needs of language educators.

This expansion reflects a shared commitment to equipping teachers and teacher educators with tools that are not only powerful and efficient but also designed with care, pedagogy and ethics in mind.

A Toolset Tailored for Language Teaching

The TeacherMatic’s Language Teaching Edition was developed specifically for language educators, offering powerful, CEFR-aligned AI generators designed for practical, everyday use. Whether planning a lesson or enhancing a sequence with differentiated tasks, TeacherMatic provides a reliable AI partner built with pedagogical depth and classroom flexibility in mind.

‘TeacherMatic is a great example of what happens when AI is developed with teachers in mind, not to replace their expertise, but to amplify it. We’re proud to see IH World lead the way in showing how responsible, curriculum-aligned AI can benefit teaching practice at scale.’ – Ian Johnstone, VP Partnerships, Avallain.

‘We built the Language Teaching Edition of TeacherMatic to solve real problems language teachers face every day, finding time to plan, adapting for different levels and contexts and meeting high standards with limited resources. IH World’s decision to adopt the platform across its global network is a strong endorsement of that mission. We’re excited to support more teachers through this collaboration.’ – Peter Kilcoyne, Managing Director, TeacherMatic.

Grounded in Ethics: Avallain Intelligence and Responsible AI

Setting the foundation of TeacherMatic is Avallain Intelligence, the responsible AI strategy that guides all development across Avallain products to ensure that AI enhances productivity while upholding the principles of ethics and safety. AI should serve as a tool to support educators, not replace them, preserving the human element at the heart of learning.

As AI becomes more embedded in education, institutions face critical questions about pedagogy, assessment and data use. Thoughtfully-designed, context-specific AI tools such as TeacherMatic, shaped through real teacher feedback, offer a path to confident, ethical innovation in the classroom.

Looking Ahead: Live Demonstrations at the IH Directors Conference 2025

With the IH Directors Conference (8th — 10th May 2025) taking place, this announcement comes at a key moment for school leaders across the IH network. Avallain will be on-site throughout the event, offering live demonstrations of the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition and engaging directly with IH directors on how AI can support their strategic goals for teaching quality and staff development.

Attendees will be able to explore the full suite of over 20 AI-powered generators included in the Language Teaching Edition, each designed to address real classroom needs. These include:

Lesson Plan Generator: Create structured lesson plans based on your inputs, such as CEFR level, target skills and pedagogical approach.
Adapt Your Content: Transform your existing content to align with your desired CEFR level, target audience and desired length.
Feedback Generator: Provide constructive feedback on student submissions, based on an assignment brief and various grading options.
Dialogue Creator: Generate natural-sounding dialogues on a given topic or situation. This can be used as role-play in class or as an example of authentic communication.
Create a text: Quickly and easily generate text tailored to your chosen vocabulary or grammar, at your desired CEFR level.

All tools are fully customisable, allowing teachers to control tone, CEFR alignment and task type, as well as pedagogical models such as Communicative Language Teaching (CLT), Lexical approach, Presentation – Practice – Production, Task-based learning and Test – Teach – Test. These features ensure materials are relevant, purposeful and appropriate for a wide range of teaching contexts.

The conference will also be an opportunity for IH leaders to learn how TeacherMatic, developed under the Avallain Intelligence framework, ensures transparency, ethical integration and institutional control, giving schools the confidence to innovate responsibly and with pedagogical integrity.

About International House World Organisation (IHWO)

International House World Organisation is a global network of over 135+ affiliated private language schools in more than 35+ countries. Since 1953, IHWO has been committed to delivering high-quality language education and teacher training, setting global standards for innovation and professionalism in the language teaching sector.

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com

About TeacherMatic

Find out more at teachermatic.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

Elevating Language Teaching with AI: Key Takeaways from the First Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar

Posted on April 30, 2025April 30, 2025 by Miguel Rivera

In our first Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar, we explored practical ways for educators and institutions to integrate AI meaningfully into lesson planning, based on real classroom needs rather than trends or automation that lacks educational value.

Elevating Language Teaching with AI: Key Takeaways from the First Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar

London, April 2025 – On April 17th, The Avallain Group hosted the first session of the new Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar Series, ‘Elevate Your Lesson Planning’.

Moderated by Giada Brisotto, Marketing Project Manager at Avallain, and led by Nik Peachey, educator, author and edtech consultant, the session focused on how the TeacherMatic Language Teaching Edition can help language educators streamline lesson planning processes while maintaining high pedagogical standards and student-centred learning.

AI as a Tool for Focused, Purposeful Support

Nik Peachey emphasised that the real value of AI in education lies in targeted, purposeful support, not blanket automation. The TeacherMatic Lesson Plan Generator is designed to help teachers:

Create comprehensive, CEFR-aligned lesson plans quickly and efficiently.
Follow a structured, step-by-step process, with clear skill selection and subscale options.
Tailor lesson outputs to meet the needs of specific learners and learning contexts.

For Nik, rather than replacing teachers’ creativity, AI acts as a scaffold, reducing administrative workload and allowing educators to focus more on engagement and personalisation.

Streamlining Planning Without Compromising Pedagogy

One of the main insights from the session was the critical balance between efficiency and academic rigour. Nik demonstrated how TeacherMatic enables teachers to create fully structured lesson plans in just a few minutes, while still:

Aligning outputs with CEFR standards.
Ensuring that every plan remains adaptable and editable to meet individual class profiles.
Supporting professional autonomy instead of imposing rigid templates.

The goal? To save time without sacrificing quality or best practices.

Building a Community Around Responsible AI Use

Beyond the tool itself, Nik highlighted the importance of cultivating a community of practice around AI integration. Participants were encouraged to:

Approach AI with a critical, ethical mindset.
Share experiences and strategies with peers to maximise the benefits of AI while safeguarding student needs.
View responsible AI as a collective, evolving dialogue, consistent with the principles of Avallain Intelligence for ethical AI in education.

A Practical First Step Toward Smarter Teaching

The overarching message of the webinar was clear: meaningful AI integration doesn’t require massive disruption. By starting with targeted applications, such as streamlining lesson planning, educators can make small changes that lead to big impacts in their teaching practice and their learners’ experience.

What’s Next: From Rubrics to Results

The Language Teaching Takeoff Webinar Series continues on Thursday, 15 May, with the next session: From Rubrics to Results: How to Provide Impactful Feedback.

In this 30-minute webinar, participants will discover how to simplify feedback processes, save time and boost student learning experiences with the help of AI.

Save the date:

Thursday, 15 May
12:00-12:30 BST | 13:00-13:30 CEST

Registration is free, but spaces are limited.

Register now

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com

About TeacherMatic

Find out more at teachermatic.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

How Can We Navigate the Path to Truly Inclusive Digital Education?

Posted on April 25, 2025May 22, 2025 by Miguel Rivera

True inclusivity in digital education demands more than good intentions. Colonial legacies still influence the technologies and systems we use today. As we embrace AI, we must consider whether it truly serves all learners or if it carries the biases of the past along with the impact of digital neo-colonialism in education. Drawing on work commissioned by UNESCO and discussions across UK universities, this is an opportunity to recognise hidden influences and ultimately create a fairer and more equitable digital learning environment.

How Can We Navigate the Path to Truly Inclusive Digital Education?

Author: John Traxler, UNESCO Chair, Commonwealth of Learning Chair and Academic Director of the Avallain Lab

What Are We Talking About?

St. Galen, April 25, 2025 – This blog draws on work commissioned by UNESCO, to be published later in the year¹, and on webinars across UK universities. Discussions about decolonising educational technology have formed part of initiatives in universities globally, alongside those about decolonising the curriculum, as part of the ‘inclusion, diversity and equity’ agenda, and in the wider world, alongside movements for reparations² and repatriation³.

This blog was written from an English perspective. Other authors would write it differently.

Decolonising is a misleadingly negative-sounding term. The point of ‘decolonising’ is often misunderstood to be merely remediation, undoing the historical wrongs to specific communities and cultures and then making amends. Yes, it is those things, but it is also about enriching the educational experience of all learners, helping them understand and appreciate the richness and diversity of the world around them.

Colonialism is not limited to the historical activities of British imperialists or even European ones. Tsarist Russia, Soviet Russia, Imperial China, Communist China and Ottoman Turkey are all examples. It remains evident within the one-time coloniser nations and the one-time colonised; Punjabi communities in the English West Midlands and Punjab itself, both still living with the active legacies of an imperial past. It is present in legacy ex-colonial education systems, in the ‘soft power’ of the Alliance Française, the Voice of America, the Goethe Institute, the British Council, the Instituto Cervantes, the World Service, the Peace Corps and the Confucius Institutes, and is now resurgent as the digital neo-colonialism of global corporations headquartered in Silicon Valley.

Why does it matter? It matters because it is an issue of justice and fairness, of right and wrong, and it matters to policy-makers, teachers, learners, employers, companies and the general public as a visible and emotive issue.

What About Educational Technology?

How is it relevant to educational technology? Firstly, ‘educational technology’ is only the tip of the iceberg in terms of how people learn with digital technology. People learn casually, opportunistically and unsupported, driven by momentary curiosity, self-improvement and economic necessity. They do so outside systems of formal instruction. Decolonising ‘educational technology’ may be easier and more specific than decolonising the digital technologies of informal learning, but they have many technologies in common.

At the most superficial level, the interactions and interfaces of digital technologies are dominated by images that betray their origins through visual metaphors such as egg-timers, desktops, files, folders, analogue clocks, wastepaper bins, gestures like the ‘thumbs up’ and cultural assumptions such as green meaning ‘go’. These technologies often default to systems and conventions shaped by history, such as the Gregorian calendar, the International Dateline, Mercator projections, Imperial weights and measures (or Système Internationale) and naming conventions like Far East, West Indies and Latin America. They also tend to prioritise the colonial legacies, European character sets, American spelling and left-to-right, top-to-bottom typing.

Speech recognition still favours the global power languages and their received pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar. Other languages and dialects only come on stream slowly; likewise, language translation. Furthermore, the world’s digital content is strongly biased in favour of these powerful languages, values and interests. Consider Wikipedia, for example, where content in English outweighs that in Arabic by about ten-to-one, and content on Middle-earth outweighs that on most of Africa. Search engines are common tools for every kind of learner, but again, the research literature highlights the bias in favour of specific languages, cultures and ideas. Neologisms from (American) English, especially for new products and technologies, are often absorbed into other languages without change.

On mobiles, the origins of textspeak from corporations targeting global markets, technically using ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange), meant different language communities were forced to adapt. For example, using pinyin letters rather than Chinese characters or inventing Arabish to represent the shape of Arabic words using Latin characters.

In reference to educational technology, we have to ask about the extent to which these embody and reinforce, specifically European, ideas about teaching, learning, studying, progress, assessment, cheating, courses and even learning analytics and library usage. Additionally, if you look at the educational theories that underpin educational technologies and then the theorists who produced them, you see only white male European faces.

The Intersection of Technology and Subjects

There is, however, the extra complication of the intersection of what we use for teaching, the technology, and what gets taught from the different topics to subjects. The subjects are also being subjected to scrutiny. This includes checking reading lists for balance and representation, refocusing history and geography, recognising marginalised scientists and engineers and the critical positioning of language learning. Language education, in particular, must navigate between the global dominance and utility of American English and the need to preserve and support mother tongues, dialects and patois, which are vital parts of the preservation of intangible cultural heritage.

The Ethical Challenges of AI

The sudden emergence of AI into educational technology is our best chance and worst fears. It is accepted that GenAI recycles the world’s digital resources, meaning the world’s misunderstandings, its misinformation, its prejudices and its biases, meaning in this case, its colonialistic mindsets, its colonising attitudes and its prejudices about cultures, languages, ethnicities, communities and peoples, about which is superior and which is inferior.

To prevent or pre-empt the ‘harms’ associated with AI-driven content, Avallain’s new Ethics Filter Feature minimises the risk of generating biased, harmful, or unethical content. Aligned with Avallain Intelligence, our broader AI strategy, this control offers an additional safeguard that reduces problematic responses, ensuring more reliable and responsible outcomes. The Ethics Filter debuted in TeacherMatic and will soon be made available for activation across Avallain’s full suite of GenAI solutions.

How Should the EdTech Industry Respond?

Practically speaking, we must recognise that the manifestations of colonialism are neither monolithic nor undifferentiated; some of these we can change, while others we cannot.

For all of them, we can raise awareness and criticality to help developers, technologists, educators, teachers and learners make judicious choices and safe decisions. To recognise their own possible unconscious bias and unthinking acceptance, and to share their concerns.

We can recognise the diversity of the people we work with, inside and outside our organisations, and seek and respect their cultures and values in what we develop and deploy. We can audit what we use and find or produce alternatives. We can build safeguards and standards.

We can select, reject, transform or mitigate many different manifestations of colonialism as we encounter them and explain to clients and users that this is a positive process, enriching everyone’s experiences of digital learning.

¹Traxler, J. & Jandrić, P. (2025) Decolonising Educational Technology in Peters, M. A., Green, B. J., Kamenarac, O., Jandrić, P., & Besley, T. (Eds.). (2025a). The Geopolitics of Postdigital Educational Development. Cham: Springer.

²Reparations refers to calls from countries, for example in the Caribbean, for their colonisers (countries, companies, monarchies, churches, cities, families) to redress the economic and financial damage caused by chattel slavery.

³Repatriation refers to returning cultural artifacts to their countries of origin, for example the Benin Bronzes, the Rosetta Stone and ‘Elgin’ Marbles currently in the British Museum.

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com

About TeacherMatic

Find out more at teachermatic.com

Contact:

Daniel Seuling

VP Client Relations & Marketing

dseuling@avallain.com

Leading with Confidence: What MATs Need to Know About GenAI in Education

Posted on April 10, 2025April 29, 2025 by Miguel Rivera

A closer look at the online briefing ‘Effective GenAI for UK Schools, Academies and MATs’ and how UK MATs are strategically implementing AI to empower teachers, streamline operations and uphold ethical standards.

Leading with Confidence: What MATs Need to Know About GenAI in Education

London, April 10, 2025 – The online briefing ‘Effective GenAI for UK Schools, Academies and MATs’ offered MAT leaders a clear, practical overview of how artificial intelligence is beginning to shift the education landscape, not just in theory, but in day-to-day classroom realities.

Get a glance of the insightful discussion by watching the recording of the webinar.

The event was moderated by Giada Brisotto, Marketing Project Manager at Avallain. The panel featured:

Shareen Wilkinson, Executive Director of Education at LEO Academy Trust
Carles Vidal, Business Director at Avallain Lab
Reza Mosavian, Senior Partnership Development Manager at TeacherMatic.

Anchored in the findings of ‘Teaching with GenAI’, an independent report produced by Oriel Square and commissioned by the Avallain Group, the message throughout the session was clear: GenAI can help MATs reduce pressure on staff, drive efficiency and maintain strategic oversight, provided implementation is ethical, measured and pedagogically sound.

From Policy to Practice: What MATs Are Actually Doing

Shareen Wilkinson, Executive Director of Education at LEO Academy Trust, outlined their structured approach to GenAI adoption, designed specifically for multi-academy environments. The trust has implemented a tiered strategy that recognises the distinct needs and responsibilities of different stakeholder groups:

Leadership and management use GenAI to enhance operational efficiency, improve decision-making through data insights and streamline trust-wide documentation.
Teachers are supported in reducing planning time, customising resources and improving assessment strategies with AI-assisted tools.
Pupils are beginning to explore safe and age-appropriate uses of GenAI, supported by clear guidance and staff oversight to ensure digital literacy and ethical use.

“We started with low-risk areas,” Wilkinson explained, “to see where time could be saved without compromising learning or safety.” The results have been encouraging. Teachers report gaining back several hours a week, while resource quality and adaptability have improved across subjects and key stages.

Key lesson for MATs: A phased, role-specific approach allows for safe experimentation, measurable impact and trust-wide consistency, without a one-size-fits-all rollout.

Empowering Teachers, Not Replacing Them

A strong theme throughout was the role of GenAI as a support mechanism to empower teachers, not replace them or create more challenges for them. “It’s not about teachers working harder,” said Wilkinson. “It’s about teachers working smarter, and having the time to focus on what really matters: the learners.”

The conversation echoed findings from the ‘Teaching with GenAI’ report, which shows that the majority of teachers believe GenAI has real potential to reduce workload. When MATs implement these tools with a clear framework, the benefits can be scaled across schools without losing autonomy or creativity at the local level.

As Carles Vidal from Avallain Lab explained, “AI should never replace educators. It should reduce workload, improve access and protect the human relationships at the heart of learning.”

Key insight: Retention improves when teachers feel supported, not sidelined. AI can ease burnout when it enhances, not replaces, teacher agency.

Ensuring Safety, Alignment and Strategic Fit

Reza Mosavian of TeacherMatic reminded leaders that GenAI implementation is not just about tools but about trust. “Ask the right questions: Who built this? Is it safe? Does it protect our staff and pupils’ data? Does it align with your values as a MAT?”

This aligns closely with Avallain Intelligence, the group’s strategy for ethical AI development in education. With this approach, the MATs sector can effectively but also safely implement Avallain’s AI solutions such as TeacherMatic, our AI toolkit for teachers, that truly enhance teaching and learning, without compromising the integrity of the classroom.

For MAT leaders, the message is to focus on safeguarding, GDPR compliance, and curriculum alignment, not on novelty or speed of rollout.

Evaluation First, Adoption Second

The speakers stressed the importance of structured evaluation before adoption. MATs should treat GenAI procurement like any strategic initiative, with clear success criteria.

Reza offered a simple rubric:

Does it save staff time?
Does it meet the needs of all learners?
Is it safe and trustworthy?
Can it scale within your trust structure?

To support this process, many MATs are finding success with a digital champion model. As highlighted in the ‘Teaching with GenAI’ report and discussed by both Reza and Shareen during the session, appointing digital champions allows schools to trial tools in context, evaluate their effectiveness and build internal confidence through peer-led engagement.

Reza noted that the most effective champions are teachers still in the classroom, or those with a strong teaching and learning background. “They’re grounded in the day-to-day pressures and can assess AI through a real pedagogical lens,” he said. A peer-led structure not only builds trust, but also ensures feedback is relevant and grounded in actual practice.

He shared the example of a school that piloted GenAI specifically for lesson planning. Teachers trialled tools within a controlled group, giving iterative feedback to refine their use. One major takeaway was the clear time-saving benefit, but equally important was the ability to assess how AI could complement, rather than replace, teachers’ existing methods.

Pilot programmes, staff feedback loops and structured trial periods emerged as crucial components of sustainable GenAI implementation. Most importantly, this collaborative and contextual approach helps to win “hearts and minds” within the organisation, laying the groundwork for long-term success.

Final Thought: Collaboration Is Our Strongest Tool

The briefing concluded with a call to leadership. MATs have a unique opportunity to shape AI’s role in UK education. By collaborating, sharing knowledge and placing ethics at the forefront, trusts can lead this change rather than react to it.

The Avallain Group remains committed to supporting MATs through research, safe tools and professional dialogue, ensuring that GenAI is a partner in progress, not a point of risk.

Explore the Full Report: Teaching with GenAI

Click here to gain deeper insights and access practical recommendations for successful GenAI implementation in the full report.

About Avallain

Find out more at avallain.com