IIT Madras, UNESCO MGIEP join hands to develop next-gen AI and immersive learning technologies

The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO)'s Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development (MGIEP) have taken the initiative to produce next-generation Artificial Intelligence (AI) and immersive learning technologies.

The agreement, confirming the collaboration, was signed recently in the presence of Obijiofor Aginam, Director, UNESCO MGIEP, Manu Santhanam, Dean (Industrial Consultancy and Sponsored Research), IIT Madras, and M Manivannan, Head of Experiential Technology Innovation Centre (XTIC) at IIT Madras.

This initiative to transform the education sphere by incorporating digital learning solutions will be supported by UNESCO MGIEP’s leadership in Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) along with IIT Madras’ expertise in AI, Extended Reality (XR), game design and immersive technologies.

The Director of UNESCO MGIEP, Obijiofor Aginam, said that the organisation will contribute to the project with its SEL expertise and alignment with UNESCO's recommendations on AI ethics and learner-centred education. The developed open-source AI is likely to boost the scale of the integration of SEL into everyday classroom practice.

This tool would also help teachers to reduce the burden by providing a temporary platform that would help them practically embed SEL into lesson plans, teaching activities, and assessments, he added. He also said that the resulting OpenAI models would be expected to be low-cost and efficient in low-bandwidth scenarios, eliminating the constant dependence on continuous internet connectivity.

According to the press release, the collaboration will also develop scalable digital learning technologies that can be adapted across various educational systems worldwide. The production will be in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4.7, which encourages education for peaceful, inclusive and sustainable societies.

In addition to the development of technological tools, the collaboration will also explore joint research in educational technology, pedagogy, AI and learning sciences. It will also open the platform for faculty and researcher exchanges, workshops, conferences and seminars, and promote interdisciplinary research at the intersection of immersive technologies, pedagogy and learning science.