Sweden went all-in on EdTech. Now it is spending £100 million to bring books back.
As England launches AI tutoring pilots in secondary schools this summer, a GB News investigation published yesterday draws a sharp comparison with Sweden, which reversed its decade-long digital classroom experiment after PISA data showed no improvement and negative effects on maths among disadvantaged pupils.
By Wistl Editorial · · Schools
Sweden was among Europe's most ambitious adopters of classroom technology. By 2015, around 80 per cent of students at state-funded high schools had access to a digital device. In 2019, tablets became compulsory in Swedish preschools. Then the results came in. International PISA data covering 2012 to 2022 showed that Sweden's one-to-one laptop policy had produced no improvement in educational outcomes and had generated small negative effects in maths among students from less-educated backgrounds. The right-wing coalition that came to power in 2022 began reversing the policy. Sweden is now subsi