AFP – A Japanese city plans to use robots to enable pupils to attend classes virtually, as truancy rates surge due to anxiety and bullying, officials said on Wednesday.
Children will be able to use devices at home to remotely manoeuvre robots that represent them at school, allowing them to take part in classes and discussions with schoolmates, the southern city of Kumamoto said.
Like other countries, Japan has seen a rise in children not attending school following the COVID-19 pandemic, with reasons for being absent ranging from difficulty fitting in to bullying, according to a government probe.
The one-metre tall robots will be self-propelling, with pupils able to move them within the school grounds and even participate in events, reports said.
“Communicating through these robots is not completely real-life, but can at least give a certain sense of reality to kids who are still unsure and afraid of interacting with others,” Kumamoto city official Maki Yoshizato told AFP.
“We hope this undertaking will help alleviate their psychological fears.”
“It is extremely important to give pupils unable to go to school more options to study,” Kumamoto Mayor Kazufumi Onishi told reporters last month.
