On Tuesday, September 2, he returned to school for first -year engineering students at ECE. They were received by François Stephan, director of the establishment, who delivered his welcome speech. But I wasn’t alone on stage. As the students noticed, a fun object was in the center of the platform, enthroned at a table.
Screen in the middle of the body, plants in the head … It is an object that you will often see during their first year. Because it is his new classmate: Milo. A “girl” like no other, presented as “the first student in engineering in the world.”
“Hello, I am Milo, an Ece Paris student in the first year of the School of Engineering,” he says in a natural and dynamic voice, also indicates that it is part of the BDE (Student Office) and invites students not to hesitate to ask for help. Because this one that joins the more than 650 students of the first year will not only help in the courses.
An impressive but perfect
Milo will take his first course, mathematics, in 10 days. But it will also be a very useful help for students, which can answer your questions about ECE.
In addition to the text, Milo can also generate equations, read documents and understand the drawings. And she impresses when she speaks, what she can talk about integrals such as ECE associations fluently. At least, most of the time. Because it is still far from being perfect.
Many things should still be improved, admits Youssef, a fourth year student who participated in his design. Starting with your response time that is too long, between 10 and 15 seconds. “At the moment, she calls two servers: one to generate the text she needs and another for vocal synthesis, that is, the voice we hear,” he said.
“In the long term, they are seconds, seconds that could have won. Therefore, the goal is to really have something as fluid as chatgpt,” adds the student.
In addition to his response time, Milo suffers from other mistakes, for example, speaking too fast as if we were watching an accelerated video. She can also stutter with words and forget some. Despite this, Youssef is quite satisfied with her current performance, because the student of the bother her beginnings.
“I was a little worried. The response time is really something that bothered me, even at the beginning. Since at the beginning, when we talked with Milo, she spoke once every two, it bothered a lot. There were many problems,” said the student.
A physical version and a digital version
If Milo is an AI like Chatgpt or Gemini, his designers have decided to give him a body.
With your 3D printed body, it will be placed next to the teacher in a course, its goal is to capture what he says to help students later, especially those who cannot attend for one reason or another.
Hose in the head, the plant is not there for anything. “In fact, the plant is not just for decoration. It is above all a useful thing. Sometimes, AI can say meaningless and stupid people. The goal is really to shoot the head to restore the program and that can work better,” reveals Youssef.
But in addition to this physical version, students can call Milo out of the lessons because it will also be available in a mobile application. Therefore, he can help a student in his search for internships, simulating an interview, for example.
And it will even be possible for AI to help students in areas that have nothing to do with school. At least, this is what Youssef states, while warning that the results may not be perfect. Something that Tech & Co also pointed out when Milo was asked for a recipe for Suzette Pancakes.
Another thing to improve and the creators will not stop there. “Ultimately, they [les étudiants] You can talk with Milo in all languages, “says François Stephan.
Soon a mill in each class
The ECE director is proud of this project, which was created quickly. Its beginnings date back to June.
Therefore, students and teachers managed to develop Milo in just three months. And they have many projects for her. In addition to attending courses and helping students daily, the AI student will also take exams, which “will be 20 of 20,” says François Stephan. The most important thing will comment on them, which indicates in particular teachers when an exam is difficult for students.
At the moment, Milo’s designers are preparing for their first mathematics lesson. But in the long term, there will not be only one. They predict developing other students of AI, potentially in new forms, so that there is one in each class. However, keep in mind that teachers will have the opportunity to reject their presence. For their part, some students were delighted with the arrival of Milo.
Having heard of Milo before, he hastened to talk about it to those around him. “I think my whole family is aware, as well as my friends. I have a friend who is there, I taught him, he was also surprised. I talked about it because it is not published,” he marvels.
For Samuel, Milo will not only be useful in relation to mathematics, electronic or physical courses. The student who is also knowing many things about ECE associations, he believes that she will also help her integrate into school.
While Samuel already uses chatgpt, “but not much,” he thinks he will use Milo a lot, so much that he will become a reflection. On the other hand, he still does not know if he will end up removing Openai’s chatbot of his smartphone to definitively replace him with his school.
Source: BFM TV
