Shedding Light on the Hidden Costs of LLMs in Education

The rapid integration of large language models (LLMs) into educational technology has been both impactful and controversial. While these models offer powerful tools for learning and teaching, they've also brought hidden environmental and computational costs that most in the field have yet to address.

Unseen Costs and Oversights

At the AIED 2025 conference, researchers scrutinized the literature and found that while LLMs are increasingly prevalent, few projects report the computational resources they consume. Even fewer acknowledge the environmental impacts of these systems. This oversight isn't just an academic issue. It's a real-world concern with ethical implications. When educational institutions adopt such technologies without transparency, they sidestep the responsibility of acknowledging their environmental footprint.

A Call for Transparency

The paper, published in Japanese, reveals a significant gap in the reporting practices within the AIED community. To address this, the researchers propose an open-source methodology to systematically measure and report these costs. Their software solutions aim to calculate the carbon footprint for both local and cloud-based hardware. They even provide a formula to estimate the computational expense of LLMs, useful when the exact parameter count is unknown. Compare these numbers side by side with other sectors. It's clear that education is lagging.

Why It Matters

Western coverage has largely overlooked this issue, focusing instead on the capabilities of LLMs rather than their costs. Yet, isn't it key for educators and policymakers to understand the true impact of the technologies they champion? The benchmark results speak for themselves. If educational technology continues to grow unchecked, ignoring these hidden costs could lead to unsustainable practices, contradicting the very ethos of education. Shouldn't transparency be at the core of educational innovation?

Ultimately, the data shows an urgent need for standardized reporting practices in the educational sector. By adopting the proposed methods, the AIED community can lead by example, promoting ethical use of technology. This isn't just an academic exercise. It's a necessary shift towards responsible innovation in education.