Zafer Unal didn’t plan to create a new way for teachers to combine artificial intelligence and the classroom experience. He started with three questions.
Unal, an education professor for over 20 years at the University of South Florida, created TeacherServer, a generative AI platform crafted specifically to help teachers plan, assess and engage with students, following a survey conducted six months ago.
The survey, which reached out to 140 K-12 teachers in Florida and Georgia, sought to understand how educators utilized AI in their classrooms by asking:
- How do you feel about AI?
- Do you use it?
- And if you are, how are you using it?
Unal said the initial assumption was that many teachers hesitated to adopt AI due to concerns about job security and data privacy.
“Teachers don’t want to get into trouble,” Unal said, “and there isn’t any system right now that is available that doesn’t ensure 100% that they are not collecting the data.”
Additionally, the results revealed educators were already employing AI to enhance their teaching methods and streamline administrative tasks — just not in the classroom.
Seeing a gap in the educational market for utilizing AI, including a lack of official training with emerging technology, Unal, who has a computer science background, decided to investigate solutions.
Using survey feedback, Unal spent months coding to create dozens of AI generative tools that “serve a purpose” and teachers could find useful in classrooms. Each tool was installed on a local server and instructed not to collect data, addressing privacy and security concerns that teachers expressed in the survey.
“AI is a hot topic,” Unal said. “Everybody’s talking about it, and some people love it, some people hate it, but it is what’s going on, and it is the future.”
After launching, Unal and TeacherServer’s advisory board designed a two-day professional development workshop embedded into the online platform, which features modules and instructional videos on generative AI tools.
But then, Unal began receiving requests from colleagues about expanding the platform to include AI resources for college faculty.
“We received requests addressing needs like research design and data analysis. At which the team decided to expand its user-friendly base to include those modifications,” Unal said.
The platform, which started with 47 tools, now includes over 800.
“It makes their jobs easier, but it’s never the final product,” Unal said. “Teachers still have to check their work, review the lesson plans and review.”
The AI platform will next incorporate audio and video inputs and outputs within the system. Unal said he is also applying for grants to fund a bigger server, which could allow him to expand the online platform nationally.
But as the school year begins, Unal said more than 100,000 K-12 teachers and college faculty consistently use the platform.
“I’ve been fascinated with how AI technology is being used so far and how it can best be used in a learning environment,” Unal said in a statement. “I see AI as another tool like the calculator or the computer, and I hope by providing this platform it allows teachers to get more comfortable with this technology and use tools that advance education.”
