The St. Petersburg university has installed smart cameras that track student involvement in classes

On October 17, 2024, it became known that a system of smart cameras began to operate at the St. Petersburg State University of Telecommunications named after Professor M.A. Bonch-Bruevich (SPbGUT), which track the level of student involvement during classes. This innovation became part of a pilot project implemented jointly with Skolkovo.

This was announced by Vice-Rector for Digital Transformation and Administrative Work of St. Petersburg State University Aleksei Zaytsev during a round table "Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence: an integral part of life or a tool for work" in the Public Chamber of St. Petersburg. The project was implemented by AB Technologies.

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The system consists of four cameras installed in streaming audiences: two aimed at the first rows, two at the rear. Cameras are able to recognize the faces of students and record cases of distraction from the educational process, for example, using a phone or falling asleep. After the class, the student, whose behavior was recorded as inattentive, receives an SMS notification with a recommendation to be more focused next time.

In addition to student control, the system allows you to evaluate the work of teachers based on the level of audience involvement. This makes it possible for the university leadership to analyze the effectiveness of the educational process and the interest of students in specific subjects.

Zaytsev also noted that artificial intelligence is actively being introduced into the educational process. According to him, 50-60% of coursework is already written using AI, which creates the need to develop tools to identify such cases.

SPbPUT pays special attention to the study of various programming languages ​ ​ and the disciplines of information security. The university is actively leveraging the power of artificial intelligence to create individual student trajectories and teaching programs for faculty.^[1]

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