Student innovators developing system for measuring attentiveness in class using facial recognition

A team of six student innovators from India and Singapore is working on a system to measure attentiveness of children in a classroom using facial recognition, video processing and image processing.

The team, which is being mentored by experts from respective countries, is competing for the Ministry of Human Resource Development's India-Singapore Hackathon, 2019, winners of which will be awarded by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras.

"The team is working on developing a method to measure attentiveness of students in a classroom using facial recognition, video processing and image processing. The system will help providing effective feedback to a teacher so that he or she can work on improving," HRD Higher Education Secretary R Subrmanayam said.

"There are 20 teams with six members each, including three from India and as many from Singapore. They are working on developing solutions to problem areas identified in India. This is the second edition of the India-Singapore Hackathon. The first one was held in Singapore," he added.

There is another team working on "sentiment analysis" of students and another on a framework to track and avoid reuse of medical waste using sensor-based smart bins.

"Stress in students is a worrying factor and many times it leads to depression, hypertension and in a few cases students may take drastic steps. Majority of students use smartphones and are active on social media. The team is working on a solution to understand psychological and emotional state of students by analysing their social media behaviour and see if we develop an early warning system," he said.

The 36-hour long fast paced hackathon will be organised at IIT Madras from September 28-29. The winning team will be awarded on September 30.

The team with the most innovative solution will be presented with a prize money worth 10,000 USD while the second, third and fourth winning teams will get USD 8000, USD 6000 and USD 4000, respectively.