Partnership highlights:
- Establishment of the first Lenovo AI-Assisted Learning Center to provide tailored and rapidly generated learning solutions for students with Special Educational Needs (SEN).
- Lenovo donates nearly HKD 2 million worth of application system solutions and services.
- Lenovo will form a volunteer team to serve SEN students.
HONG KONG SAR –
Media OutReach Newswire – 16 October 2024 – Lenovo announces a collaboration with the Bridge Foundation to establish Hong Kong’s first Lenovo AI Hub, aimed at providing more SEN students with high-quality, personalized education.
Lenovo announces a collaboration with the Bridge Foundation to establish Hong Kong’s first Lenovo AI Hub, witnessed by Ms. CHEONG Man Lei, Lillian, JP (second from left), Under Secy for Innovation, Technology and Industry of the Hong Kong SAR Government, Dr. Yan Weizhi (second from right), Level 3 Researcher of the Education and Technology Department of the Liaison Office of the Central People’s Government, along with Ms. Serena Cheung (far left), General Manager of Lenovo Hong Kong and Macau, and Mr. Victor Wong (far right), Founder of the Bridge Foundation. The memorandum of cooperation was signed by Mr. Jonathan Cheng (third from left), Head of Strategy and Sales, Lenovo Hong Kong and Macau, and Dr. Bosco Chan (third from right), Director of the Bridge Foundation aimed at providing more SEN students with high-quality, personalized education.
The newly established Lenovo AI Hub is equipped with Lenovo AI hardware and hybrid AI technology solutions, including computer vision, natural language processing, and robotic process automation (RPA). This ensures that Bridge Foundation therapists and educators can provide timely, personalized support to the growing number of SEN students, helping them create a brighter future.
According to the memorandum signed by both parties, Lenovo is donating nearly HKD 2 million worth of application system solutions and services to the Aoi Pui School. Lenovo will also collaborate with the Bridge Foundation to use AI to build an SEN expert system. This system will leverage the techniques and experiences of therapists while observing and recording data on students’ responses, emotions, and environmental changes during therapy sessions, thereby generating more accurate Individualized Education Plans (IEPs). Additionally, AI systems will generate training materials to empower teachers, therapists, classroom assistants, and even social volunteers to provide better services for SEN students.
Serena Cheung, General Manager for Hong Kong and Macau, stated: “Lenovo has always been committed to the vision of ‘Smarter AI for All.’ AI technology is unleashing powerful potential across various industries, and its application in education can significantly enhance learning efficiency and improve the learning experience. It allows SEN students to be better understood and supported by others, while enabling teachers and therapists to assist each student in a more personalized way, optimizing valuable learning time. We are particularly excited about how technology can genuinely help education and communities in need.”
Victor Wong, Founder of Bridge Foundation, remarked: “The vision of the Bridge Foundation is to provide better services for special educational support. Our collaboration with Lenovo enables us to offer a more comprehensive SEN expert system solution, covering a wider range of therapeutic professionals, including speech and occupational therapists, social workers, and educational psychologists. By establishing an ecosystem to support professionals, we will significantly improve the learning experience for SEN students.”
The collaboration between Lenovo and the Bridge Foundation has already yielded significant results at Aoi Pui School, increasing training efficiency by 116% and allowing therapists to train more SEN students simultaneously, overcoming the limitations of traditional one-on-one therapy.
AI Brings More Efficient Treatment to SEN Students
Currently, Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) therapy is a widely recognized evidence-based method for treating SEN children. At present, there are around 64,200 students with SEN in Hong Kong’s public sector ordinary schools[1] while the current number of licensed ABA therapists is still below 100. AI systems provide a new solution, making ABA therapy more precise and effective.
The Lenovo AI Hub automates the previously cumbersome and error-prone processes of data collection, recording, and response scoring, generating personalized learning plans for students. This allows ABA therapists to focus more on direct interactions with SEN students. Additionally, by integrating voice, object, and gesture recognition technologies with the environmental and emotional sensors from the Bridge Foundation, therapists can conduct more targeted assessments of students’ classroom performance and select follow-up treatment tasks from a vast ABA database.
Lenovo not only provides edge servers and AI PCs to support ABA therapy’s AI models but also offers the Smart Whiteboard as interactive teaching tools, making the therapy process more focused and engaging, thereby enhancing treatment efficiency and quality. The collaboration between Lenovo and the Bridge Foundation has already yielded significant results at Aoi Pui School, increasing training efficiency by 116% and allowing therapists to train more SEN students simultaneously, overcoming the limitations of traditional one-on-one therapy.
In the future, Lenovo will actively collaborate with the Bridge Foundation to replicate this successful model in Southeast Asian markets, promoting inclusive education and providing SEN students with better learning experiences.
Actively Contributing to a More Caring Society
Lenovo will establish a volunteer team to support this project, encouraging employees and their families, as well as students majoring in early childhood or special education, to participate in this special educational service. The goal is to provide therapy courses for 180 SEN students from disadvantaged communities within a year, totaling over 5,000 hours of learning. Volunteers will receive financial support and training under the remote supervision of experienced ABA therapists to become classroom aides.
Keith Wong from the Lenovo volunteer team stated, “The AI teaching and experiences provided by the Lenovo AI Hub enable volunteers to quickly obtain the necessary training, preparing them to help SEN students and provide free support services to more families in need. Participating in volunteer services has made me deeply aware of the power of AI in special education. I look forward to more young people using cutting-edge technologies like AI to engage in volunteer work, giving back to society and contributing to social development and technological innovation.”
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