On 8 December 2025, PolyU held the Second Education Transformation and Innovation (ETI) Salon continuing its mission to spearhead PolyU Education 4.0 (E4.0). Hosted by Professor Jiannong CAO, Vice President (Education), the session welcomed over 100 participants—including visiting students from City University of Hong Kong—to explore practical case studies of AI integration and student-staff partnerships.
Professor Cao opened the salon by commending the growing momentum among staff in embracing digital transformation. He noted that the university’s pioneering role is being realised through the leadership of frontline educators who are moving beyond theory to implement tangible, AI-driven solutions in their classrooms.
The first presentation by Professor Jeffrey LEUNG, Assistant Professor of School of Optometry demonstrated how AI can lower technical barriers to unlock student creativity. In his Year 4 clinical binocular vision course, students were traditionally tasked with designing hardware prototypes for vision therapy. By introducing AI coding assistants, Professor Leung enabled students (most of whom lacked programming backgrounds) to develop sophisticated software-based solutions and interactive games for clinical use. This shift allowed students to offload technical hurdles to AI and focus their energies on clinical reasoning and creative problem-solving, effectively transforming the educator’s role into that of a clinical coach and logical guide.
Dr Rodney CHU, Senior Lecturer of Department of Applied Social Sciences then shifted the focus to the human element of technology through the TIMS framework (Technology Integration, Interdisciplinary Collaboration, Multimodal Assessment, and Student-Staff Partnership). Dr Chu introduced the Virtual Assistant TIMS (VAT), an AI-powered platform providing real-time lecture summaries, podcasts, and instant Q&A support. Central to his approach is the concept of "reciprocity," where students are not just consumers of AI but active partners in content creation and peer mentoring. This collaborative model has already seen successful cross-departmental adoption and international interest, proving that Education 4.0 is as much about partnership as it is about platforms.
The potential for personalized learning at scale was addressed by Professor Haitian LU, Hong Kong Sustaintech Foundation Professor in Accounting and Finance, who introduced the AI Tutor Agent. Designed to tackle the limitations of "one-size-fits-all" teaching, this course-specific bot utilises syllabi, lecture notes, and past papers to provide bilingual, 24/7 support with built-in source-tracing for transparency. Professor Lu shared encouraging results from pilot implementations, noting that while the initial investment in data preparation is significant, the long-term benefit is a "human-in-the-loop" system that frees academics from repetitive administrative queries, allowing for more meaningful, higher-level interactions with students.
In his closing remarks, Professor Cao emphasised that the future of higher education requires a fundamental shift in mindset. He encouraged staff to view AI not as a replacement, but as a catalyst for a more adaptive and resilient pedagogical framework. The second ETI Salon concluded with a call for continued interdisciplinary collaboration and the ongoing sharing of innovations to ensure PolyU remains at the cutting edge of the global educational landscape.
| Research Units | School of Optometry | Department of Applied Social Sciences | School of Accounting and Finance |
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