While building ProfDesk, I spent a lot of time talking to fellow instructors about the parts of teaching they enjoy versus the parts they wish they could automate.
For me, it wasn't teaching itself. It was grading, attendance, organizing submissions, and preparing Outcome-Based Education (OBE) reports.
I'm a university lecturer and Ph.D. student, and ProfDesk started as a tool I built to solve my own teaching challenges.
Like many instructors, I relied on Canvas Free for Teachers. After the cyberattack, I realized how dependent I had become on a platform that also lacked some of the flexibility I needed, such as submitting work on behalf of students. At my university, we also don't have a dedicated LMS, and teaching assistants aren't always available.
I was spending more time grading assignments, tracking attendance, and preparing Outcome-Based Education (OBE) reports than actually teaching or doing research.
So I started building ProfDesk.
What began as an AI grading assistant has evolved into an AI grading desk that helps educators generate rubrics, bulk-grade PDF and scanned assignments, detect copied work, automate attendance, manage students without requiring email accounts, and map CLOs to PLOs for accreditation.
My goal isn't to replace teachers. It's to remove repetitive administrative work so educators can spend more time teaching, mentoring students, and doing the work they enjoy.
I'd love to hear your feedback. What is the most time-consuming part of teaching that you wish software could handle?