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University working with UNITH for AI-powered Digital Professors to address burgeoning student demand

University students in South America may soon have greater access to high quality tertiary education with artificial intelligence company UNITH (ASX: UNT) confirming it is in discussions with a University to deploy Digital Professors that will be powered by conversational AI.

The University, which was not named due to the sensitivity of commercial discussions, cited the rising disparity between educators and the demand to provide adequate attention to each student seeking assistance in a timely manner.

Teacher shortages in Australia have been well publicised, with the Federal Government introducing a National Teacher Workforce Action Plan in 2022 to address a dangerous shortage in teachers nationwide, impacting the learning development of students. A similar shortage is also faced in South America, contributed to by the rising middle class where tertiary education is more sought after than 40 years ago. Furthermore, digitisation of education and student mobility has also contributed to rising student numbers as education has become more accessible.

With student numbers rising and teacher numbers limited, the teacher-to-student ratio – a metric that has proven to impact education quality – is strained when students have limited access to their teachers, or professors in Universities.

On a call with investors last week, UNITH confirmed how they’re working with a University to alleviate the burden of professors who can better spread their attention and knowledge by replicating themselves as a digital human.

“Their number of students is growing, drastically much more than they are used to for people doing online courses and their professors are struggling to respond to all the questions these students have about the course material,” said Dr Rakan Sleiman, VP of Product at UNITH.

“So with these digital humans, the intention is to be a supporting hand to professors [and] to answer questions students have about the course material.

“We’re starting on that journey with them and we will measure how many students speak with a Digital Professor, and all the metrics that we can measure about those conversations.”

The use of digital humans to alleviate the workload of understaffed departments is becoming a common theme amongst UNITH clients. Recently, the Alliance for Public Health deployed a range of UNITH digital humans that can provide healthcare advice throughout Eastern Europe that are proficient in multiple languages and synced up with local social services.

Similarly, with Spanish and Portuguese as the two most spoken languages in South America while English is common throughout tertiary education – it makes sense for a Digital Professor to be able to clarify course material in an alternative language if the spoken one is not fully comprehended.

Where Digital Professors can prove more efficient than the general internet to students is UNITH’s conversational AI capabilities. Students can converse with a Digital Professor in real time, while the knowledge base can be drawn from a closed set of material. This information source can be controlled and updated by the Professor to only include material that is relevant to the course material and prevent students from veering too far off the prescribed course content.

The use of Digital Professors can gain further value through their capacity to be available 24/7. Such accessibility would complement the real professors who have limited consult hours, outside of their teaching hours. Students that primarily complete their studies online would stand to benefit from such accessibility, as well as students with queries when their Professor is preoccupied with other students.

According to a 2022 Keystone Education Group survey of more than 20,000 students worldwide, there was a 234.9% increase in the year-on-year popularity of online classes, whereby students could either watch live online, or the recordings in their own time.

In the event of students watching replays at night, a Digital Professor would have the capability to respond immediately to questions about coursework, or escalate the matter for a live response the following day.

South America is no stranger to UNITH which already operates in the region with bilingual customer service agents that are deployed for online lottery ticket sales and service, fluent in Spanish and English.

UNITH CEO Idan Schmorak confirmed the collaboration with the unnamed University was still in the early stages and that it is common for UNITH clients to request their names not be disclosed publicly as businesses around the world face staff anxiety amid the AI revolution.