At the end of last semester, Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) and Shanghai High School International Division (SHSID) jointly funded an Artificial Intelligence (AI) lab on Computer Vision and Machine Learning (CVML). Fifteen grade 9 to grade 11 students participated in this program.

During the following winter break, the students were assigned with tons of reading materials as well as coding practice as a jump start. Since the beginning of this semester, AI lab program has been rolled out with full speed. Professor Ni Bingbing and his team from SJTU traveled to the SHSID campus every Friday afternoon to provide lectures on a series of AI topics with lab work supervision, as well as homework assignments. The first few lectures were not easy, yet with Professor Ni and his team’s vivid teaching style, the Friday after-school AI lab studies soon became the most expected one for many of the students. Throughout the semester, the students not only learned many topics in AI, but also utilized numerous libraries of Python, and then experimented how parameters in the codes producing different results. The semester ended up with small group projects on three topics: generative adversarial network (GAN), recommender system, and semantic segmentation and object detection.

On the afternoon of June 14th, the students visited the AI Research Institute of SJTU as the last session for this semester. The conclusion meeting opened up with a speech from Mr. He, the AI Research Institute leader at SJTU. He welcomed SHSID students for joining this program and talked about his vision on AI researches. Then, Professor Ni, the main instructor for the program, summarized the topics conducted during this semester and laid out his future plans. He suggested the learning of more practical subjects such as human face detection, image search recommendation and the design of unmanned ground vehicles, a few hot areas that could engage the students even better in the near future. Professor Ni also mentioned the wishes of many students—doing more challenging research projects, which can further enhance the students’ abilities in more dimensions.

After the opening speeches, the students went up by groups and each presented their reflection for the program, learnings from the final project, as well as the suggestions to make this program more productive. Every student reflected that they have benefited a lot through the AI course, and even extend some of the learnings in competitions outside of the school, as well as applying their AI knowledge into other activities. Then, Mr. Liao from SHSID wrapped up the meeting and hoped that the students can be motivated to achieve more in breadth and in depth under the guidance of Professor Ni and his team. The trip to SJTU successfully ended with a visit to the AI laboratory, where students got to witness the various fields that AI can be applied to and the astonishing results created by AI research.

Group Presentation Sessions

The research and application of AI would make a significant impact on every aspect of the students’ lives now and in the near future. The AI lab program was such an eye-opening to SHSID students that they look forward to more exciting learnings in the next school year!

（Written by Adelynn Tang 9(10)      Pictures by Liao Hui        Edited by He Tianzhou）