Take a journey of discovery and reflection with the BSc(AI&ET) programme

Artificial intelligence (AI) has been making big strides in improving many aspects of people’s lives. Educators have been making numerous attempts over the last few decades to harness the technology to transform education in various ways, from reducing their workload on marking papers to detecting likely cases of plagiarism. The exponential growth of AI in recent years has enabled the technology to play a much bigger role in education and respond to the need to engage and motivate students more deeply and personally in learning. 

There is ample evidence that personalised learning can raise students’ motivation to learn, generally leading to better learning outcomes. However, understanding the needs of individual students is never an easy task – something is further complicated by the fact that Hong Kong, like many developed economies, is committed to providing an inclusive education where students with special needs can learn in the same classroom as other students. The more diverse the learning abilities and motivations of students are, the more varied the learning plan must be in order to suit the needs of every individual student, making it all the more challenging for teachers to tailor their respective teaching plans.

It is no simple task to discern the learning patterns that are unique to each student concerned and design individual programmes that support such patterns accordingly. It requires accumulating and decoding huge amounts of information about each student. This is where AI can be of particular use. With its immense calculating and analysing ability, AI is indisputably the best option for such a task.

AI-powered analytics can enable educators to collect information about the learning progress of their students, helping educators to develop insights behind their progress and find out relationships between various factors that affect learning. Supported by AI analytics, teachers can then devise the best learning programme tailored to the corresponding strengths, weaknesses and progress of each student.

Currently, there are many AI-enabled tools that teachers can use to collect helpful information about students. “Heart rate variability (HRV) is a good biomarker to assess emotion. By asking students to wear an AI-assisted wristband, teachers can trace the emotional changes of students, hence gauging their engagement levels in the class,” said Dr Henry So Chi-fuk, Senior Lecturer II at the Department of Mathematics and Information Technology (MIT).

Dr So said the educational sector in many developed countries has been boldly using AI to monitor students’ behavior. Some schools install an AI-sensor to screen the whole classroom to detect emotional variations among students. “By reading their facial expressions, the AI-sensor can identify students who are dozing off, yawning and losing attention. Once these struggling students are located, teachers can then introduce corresponding measures to help them catch up,” Dr So continued.  

The function of AI in teaching and learning goes way beyond just passively monitoring the learning progress of students. It can take up an active teaching role as well. For example, educational robots are used to engage students in schools around the world. “Robots never complain about boredom. They can answer a student’s repeated enquiry without ever being annoyed. Robots can even mimic simple human emotion and interactions, so that students find it even more pleasant to interact and learn from them. Robots can motivate students that way,” said the scholar in AI and educational technology (EdTech).  

Dr So himself is a big fan of robotic technology. Speaking of automated human-like machines, Dr So cannot help appreciating their beauty. “They are available 24/7. They can perform repetitive, boring and hazardous tasks. They can behave as gently as a private tutor when answering enquires, yet also act like a fearless fighter when facing ‘life-threatening’ dangers, whether it is defusing a bomb or fighting a blazing fire,” he said.

In response to the huge potential of AI in the education field, EdUHK and FLASS has launched the Bachelor of Science (Honours) in Artificial Intelligence and Educational Technology (BSc(Hons) AI&EdTech) in the academic year 2022/23. Response to the programme has been encouraging so far. “The programme accepts both first-year entries and senior-year admissions. In 2022/23, we have admitted 26 first-year students and 26 senior-year students,” Dr So said.

The BSc(Hons) AI&EdTech programme covers the basics for both AI and EdTech. The AI curriculum of the programme includes neural networks, Natural Language Processing, data mining, machine learning and deep learning. On the EdTech side, it teaches STEM education, computer vision, 3D design and printing and AR/VR. 

Having strong links to “real life” activities is a distinctive feature of the programme. Students enrolled in this programme can select courses like Digital Games and Learning in Educational Settings and Applied Robotics with Applications to Special Education, to mention but a few. These courses emphasise the real-life existence of AI and EdTech in digital games and robots. “The BSc(Hons) AI&EdTech programme not only teaches students hard knowledge in AI and EdTech, but also broadens their horizons about how these technologies have been applied in the education sector,” Dr So remarked. 

Besides the appeal of teaching a mix of theoretical knowledge and real-life applications, another big draw of this programme is the opportunity to intern at big AI or EdTech corporations in Hong Kong. “We are liaising with big companies like SenseTime, Nvidia and NetDragon. Internship opportunities not only provide a real work environment for our students to polish what they have learnt from textbooks, but also raise students’ exposure to the job market, hence helping their job hunting after graduation.”

The overall design of the BSc(Hons) AI&EdTech programme is to train our students to have the technical knowledge and abilities to fully comply with market demand for programmers, data analysts, software engineers and app developers. For students aspiring to become a teacher, they can pursue a PGDE degree upon graduation which will allow them to teach Design and Technology (D&T) or Information Communications Technology (ICT) at secondary schools.

There is no doubt that the application of AI will continue to broaden in personal communication, social networking, medicine, industry and commerce, and education. In view of such a trend, Dr So said there is a rising need for primary and secondary schools to employ Education Technology officers (ETO) so that they have the technical support to launch new courses about AI. Graduates from the BSc(AI&EdTech) programme are well qualified to become ETOs who can use their knowledge in AI and EdTech to facilitate the use of education technology in primary and secondary schools.

The development of AI is so rapid that even experts feel that they are always falling behind. For instance, ChatGPT's recent viral sensation has stunned many people. “ChatGPT uses Natural Language Processing (NLP), a branch of AI that teaches computers to understand how humans write and speak. By using the GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) model developed by OpenAI and advanced machine learning technology – another subfield of AI focusing on imitating human communications – ChatGPT can give astonishingly human-like answers,” Dr So explained.

“While AI is advancing at an astonishing pace, it will continue to unlock unlimited possibilities in many fields, including industry, finance, health management, space exploration and education,” Professor Philip Yu Leung-ho, Head of MIT, said. He emphasised that with how AI is driving a new industrial revolution with ever increasing productivity, efficiency and preciseness, it is expected to set a whole new ball game.

“Since the appearance of AI, there have been ongoing discussions about the underlying ethical issues regarding AI development, including whether manmade intelligence will ultimately replace and overpower human beings. With the emergence of chat tools as powerful as ChatGPT, which can generate convincing and contextually sensible sentences, educators are worried about whether students will use this tool to do assignments and write articles for them,” Professor Yu said.

The role of AI has been evolving from marking papers, collecting massive amounts of data about students, designing personalised learning plans, to encouraging plagiarising acts. Against the multiple and augmenting roles of AI, people have been asking questions such as: “Is artificial intelligence a blessing or a threat to education work?” There is never an easy answer to such a question. But one thing is sure: as an institute focusing on education, we are not just teaching our students hard knowledge about AI but also guiding them towards constantly reflecting upon related ethical issues. To prospective students interested in AI and educational technology, Professor Yu said MIT welcomes them to apply for the BSc(Hons) AI&EdTech programme, and to join the department in a journey of discovery and reflection.

Click here for more details about the BSc(Hons) AI&EdTech programme.