Artificial Intelligence Dominates Educational Technology Discussion

I spent the last three days in Valencia, Spain, attending the 19th annual International Technology, Education and Development Conference (INTED2025), which is one of my favorite conferences when it comes to the advances in educational technology. One of the main reasons I always enjoy this conference is its diverse audience, which not only consists of academics, but also practitioners, decision makers, and pretty much anybody who has an interest in educational technology.

This year was quite remarkable with respect to the dominance of artificial intelligence as a conference topic. There were around 550 attendees and 360 presentations, and my feeling was that the vast majority of those talked about artificial intelligence in one way or another. And even if they did not talk about it, they at least used AI-generated images in their presentations—usually of questionable quality, by the way.

It is quite fascinating how quickly and radically education has embraced AI as a tool. This is, of course, also the result of how quickly and radically society in general has embraced AI. But nonetheless, education tends to be rather conservative in its approach and I did not anticipate the pace with which AI has taken over entire conferences. Looking ahead, I anticipate more critical work on AI emerging in the coming months and years. At this conference, very few presenters addressed the negative or problematic aspects of AI in education in a way that I felt demonstrated genuine expertise in AI.

I gave two presentations at INTED2025, both of which I recorded and put as unlisted videos on my YouTube channel. The first one was about the Process-Centered Critique Model, which I also covered in my Substack post “Beyond the Final Product.” In case you are wondering, I was a bit distracted during this presentation. I could not see the screen and was never quite sure what the audience was seeing. But I hope it is still a worthwhile watch.

My second presentation was at the very end of the last day of the conference. This is usually a time where attendance is very low. To my surprise, the session was extremely well attended. The presentation was about the Four Lenses Framework (critical reading, critical seeing, critical listening, and critical making) which I also wrote about in my previous Substack post.

I left the conference with many insights about the relationship between AI and education. In the coming months, I’ll be sharing these ideas through this Substack blog and in academic papers. If you’re interested in following these developments, I encourage you to subscribe to stay informed as the conversation around AI in education continues to evolve.

And for those with an interest in educational technology in general, I highly recommend the annual INTED conference series. Beyond taking place in one of the world’s most beautiful regions, it provides an invaluable opportunity to network with academics and practitioners in education from across the globe. I will certainly be back in 2026.