A professor in artificial intelligence at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), Lee Soo-young, said 5G would change the way students learn in universities.

“Universities must be ready to adapt to these new platforms because they are bound to face competition from institutions that will offer fully online courses,” he said during the 5G Tech 2021 conference today.

“The transformation in how we teach today will inevitably involve augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) content.”

According to Lee, 5G technology could drive the future of education by emphasising each student’s unique capabilities and their ability to learn, while giving them the option to attend classes in person or remotely.

“One of the major trends we foresee is each student having his own artificial private tutor. The technology should be able to monitor the progress of the students, studying patterns and life goals.

“In Korea we have a few education institutions working on this, and we are very close to coming up with a solution. We are however not implementing this for university students, but looking at kindergarten and elementary school where there is more demand,” Lee said.

NUS executive education fellow Jim Lim said 5G networks would provide an immersive learning experience which would require high processing power.

He said smart classrooms would overtake traditional settings, where devices could be inter-connected with real-time imagery and lessons being taught all at once.

“For instance, in China, attendance taking is conducted using facial recognition, while in London, real-time training has been used for firemen and surgery and healthcare for doctors and nurses.

“Covid-19 accelerated the virtual space in a huge way and this has been a progress for many of us. The devices must have the ability and application to strengthen the 5G network,” Lim noted.