Private tuition was this week labelled the “hidden secret” in the “arms race” of education.

Now scientists have developed the latest weapon: an algorithm to match pupils with tutors, using artificial intelligence.

University College London’s (UCL) Institute of Education has partnered with the online tutoring platform MyTutor to harness technology to create the “tutor of the future”.
Parents are asked a series of questions about their child’s personality: whether they are creative, logical, confidence, anxious and so on.

The information is fed into an algorithm that matches them up with a series of tutors to choose from, who have similar characteristics to the child's.
James Grant, co-founder of MyTutor, said that building a “strong rapport” between a tutor and student is crucial for academic success.

He said he believes that AI will be the future of tutoring, adding: “Tutoring is something that hasn’t really changed in so many years. If tutoring can cost less, be more convenient and better quality, then that has to be the future of tutoring."

Professor Rose Luckin, from UCL’s Institute of Education, said: “One of the difficult problems is the matching of a student and a tutor.

“We are starting to develop a way of using artificial intelligence to automate the interview process and make sure the initial relationship has the potential to be successful.”
f tutoring can cost less, be more convenient and better quality, then that has to be the future of tutoring
James Grant, founder of MyTutor
Prof Luckin said she believes the use of artificial intelligence in education will become increasingly common in the coming years – but at the moment people are too “apprehensive” about it because “as soon as you say I want to have your child’s data” they lost interest.

“There is a reticence for a lot of people when it comes to technology that they don’t understand,” she said. “I think people need to see the benefits and how it can work for them, then we can really start to progress.”

Earlier this week a study revealed that almost a third of children have had private tuition, labelling it the “hidden secret” in an “educational arms race” that reinforces the advantages of richer children, according to the Sutton Trust.

Teenagers from wealthier families are twice as likely to have received additional help compared with their poorer classmates. Meanwhile those from minority ethnic backgrounds are more likely to have had a tutor than white pupils, according to a report by the Sutton Trust, a social mobility think tank.