Alef Education is accelerating AI-powered, teacher-led learning through a year-round professional development model that equips 2,300 educators with the skills to integrate artificial intelligence across all stages of instruction, the company said in a press release. The initiative extends beyond initial platform training to cover lesson planning, classroom delivery, formative assessments, differentiation and data-informed adjustments. It combines in-person and virtual workshops with self-paced modules on Alef Academy, subject-specific coaching and continuous implementation support while introducing Alef AI for Teachers tools such as Toki Studio, Magic Buttons and Generative Apps to streamline resource creation without relinquishing educator oversight.
Geoffrey Alphonso, chief executive officer of Alef Education, emphasised the centrality of teachers in the statement. “The future of education depends on empowering teachers, not replacing them. By combining sustained professional learning with curriculum-aligned AI, we are enabling educators to spend less time on administrative preparation and more time doing what matters most – engaging students, responding to their learning needs and delivering high-quality instruction,” Alphonso said. The programme links each capability to instructional objectives, for instance showing how analytics can reveal student understanding in real time to guide targeted interventions or extensions.
Alef Education operates in approximately 20,000 schools throughout the UAE and Indonesia, delivering personalised experiences to roughly 2 million students and supporting more than 85,000 educators overall, according to the company. It has recorded complete platform uptake in Cycle 2 and Cycle 3 grades along with an 8.5 percent rise in Arabic and mathematics test scores in Indonesia. The Abu Dhabi-headquartered firm, which listed on the local stock exchange after its founding in 2016, secured first place in the Middle East and Africa and 13th globally in TIME magazine’s 2026 ranking of 6,500 edtech companies.
A Grand View Research assessment projected the Middle East and Africa AI in education market to expand at a compound annual growth rate of 27.2 percent from 2026 to 2033. Technavio data separately forecasts the UAE education market to grow by 5.2 billion U.S. dollars from 2026 to 2030 at an 8.3 percent annual pace. The UAE ranked as the world’s leading adopter of artificial intelligence in early 2026 with a 70.1 percent uptake among its working-age population, a regional review indicated.
The latest professional learning expansion forms part of Alef Education’s wider portfolio that includes the flagship Alef Platform for AI-driven instruction, the self-paced Alef Pathways supplement, the Abjadiyat Arabic literacy system and the Arabits platform for non-native speakers, the statement added. It promotes a responsible model that pairs technological efficiency with teacher expertise and professional judgment to advance personalised, inclusive and evidence-based learning at scale. A MarkNtel Advisors report placed the GCC edtech sector on a 6.74 percent compound annual growth trajectory through 2030, with AI-enabled personalised learning cited among the leading drivers.
