Students and staff of Nanyang Polytechnic (NYP) and working professional can look forward to AI training courses.
AI Education in Singapore
The courses are offered as part of the newly inked Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between NYP and YITU Technology. The latter conducts AI research and innovation for advanced AI-based business solutions in the areas of machine vision, speech and language understanding.
A three-year partnership, the MoU serves to jointly develop industry-relevant AI training courses aimed at boosting local AI skillsets, in line with Singapore’s Smart Nation push. Continuous education and workforce upskilling are key messages of the Smart Nation initiative.
The company’s R&D Director, Dr Zhang Zhenjie said, “The rapid advancement of AI technologies plays an important role in furthering Singapore’s Smart Nation vision. As more enterprises seek to adopt AI to pivot and transform their businesses, there has also been a corresponding demand for AI expertise and skillsets. Our collaboration with NYP is a timely step forward in addressing the growing industry demand for AI talent.”
Participants of the program will be informed on real-life AI applications and case studies based on the AI company’s insights into industry trends will be part of the curriculum.
Furthermore, students and staff of NYP will be granted access to the company’s AI technologies to build their own AI applications for final-year and R&D projects in related areas such as aerospace, Internet of Things (IoT) and Human Factor Engineering.
During the AI training, students and staff will be equipped with practical hands-on experience in building AI applications for industries which include retail and financial services.
Taking the classroom into the real world, the company will provide internship opportunities for NYP learners and NYP staff training as well as company visits. Close to 300 spaces have been allocated for this opportunity.
AI Education: A Lifelong Journey
For those out of school but ready to hit the books again, the MoU provides advanced and masterclass AI courses which have been jointly developed by NYP and YITU. The classes are part of NYP’s Continuing Education and Training (CET) curriculum. The AI courses have a special focus on upskilling and retraining to prepare CET learners for AI-related roles. This will be important as more jobs in the future will require some form of AI in workplace processes.
Mr Lee Youn Kay, Director of NYP’s School of Engineering said, “AI is a disruptive technology capable of transforming various industries. Through this timely collaboration between NYP and YITU, our learners will continue to deepen their skillsets in AI. They will be able to harness AI technologies to tackle challenges faced by retail and other industries, creating more opportunities for this technology to be used in both work and play.”
This isn’t the first time the company has collaborated with an academic institution. Since its launch, the company has been focused on developing the local AI talent pool through deep partnerships with academia and industry.
A Partnership of Opportunities
Three other areas of collaboration have also been set out in the MoU, deepening the partnership between the organisations.
The first is to enhance student engagement. Partners will explore the use of AI technologies to enhance campus services and improve classroom training.
Second, more efforts will be placed on improving employee readiness-for-work evaluation. AI technologies can be used to evaluate this, thus raising workplace productivity.
Thirdly, the partners seek to use AI retail technologies to offer consumers a unique retail experience and boost a retailer’s competitive edge.
The YITU R&D Centre will be available to NYP staff and students to research and testbed these AI solutions. They will also have the opportunity to work closely with the company’s AI researchers.
