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The teaching profession is under siege.

Working hours for teachers are increasing as student needs become more complex and administrative and paperwork burdens increase.

According to a recent McKinsey survey, conducted in a research partnership with Microsoft, teachers are working an average of 50 hours a week1—a number that the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development Teaching and Learning International Survey suggests has increased by 3 percent over the past five years.2 While most teachers report enjoying their work, they do not report enjoying the late nights marking papers, preparing lesson plans, or filling out endless paperwork.

Burnout and high attrition rates are testaments to the very real pressures on teachers.

In the neediest schools in the United States, for example, teacher turnover tops 16 percent per annum.3 In the United Kingdom, the situation is even worse, with 81 percent of teachers considering leaving teaching altogether because of their workloads.4 Further disheartening to teachers is the news that some education professors have even gone so far as to suggest that teachers can be replaced by robots, computers, and artificial intelligence (AI).5 Our research offers a glimmer of hope in an otherwise bleak landscape.

The McKinsey Global Institute’s 2018 report on the future of work suggests that, despite the dire predictions, teachers are not going away any time soon.

In fact, we estimate the school teachers will grow by 5 to 24 percent in the United States between 2016 and 2030.

For countries such as China and India, the estimated growth will be more than 100 percent.6 Moreover, our research suggests that, rather than replacing teachers, existing and emerging technologies will help them do their jobs better and more efficiently.

Our current research suggests that 20 to 40 percent of current teacher hours are spent on activities that could be automated using existing technology.

That translates into approximately 13 hours per week that teachers could redirect toward activities that lead to higher student outcomes and higher teacher satisfaction.

In short, our research suggests that existing technology can help teachers reallocate 20 to 40 percent of their time to activities that support student learning.

Further advances in technology could push this number higher and result in changes to classroom structure and learning modalities, but are unlikely to displace teachers in the foreseeable future.

Many of the attributes that make good teachers great are the very things that AI or other technology fails to emulate: inspiring students, building positive school and class climates, resolving conflicts, creating connection and belonging, seeing the world from the perspective of individual students, and mentoring and coaching students.

These things represent the heart of a teacher’s work and cannot— and should not—be automated.

Make no mistake, the value of a good education starts early and lasts a lifetime.

Research suggests that simply having an effective kindergarten teacher can affect the likelihood of a student completing college thus boosting their lifetime earnings by about $320,000.7 Technology, when used correctly, can facilitate good teaching, but it will never replace teachers.

In the remainder of this article, we will outline how teachers spend their time today, how technology can help to save teacher time, and where that additional time might go.

Note that we are intentionally focused on the impact of technology on teacher time.

In future articles we will address its broader impact on student learning.