The NVIDIA DGX station, pronounced en-vid-iah, is a $65,000 personal supercomputer and the first of its kind in Australia, has been commissioned after arriving in the country at the end of last year and will officially begin a technological revolution for students, educators and online TAFE courses.

“We are using our station to help design personalised learning programs for students,” ​machine learning specialist Dave Dean said.

MORE READING

“So we can look at students as they go through our online learning platforms, and virtual and augmented reality learning experiences, and look how they go through them. We can customise those experiences based on that.”

The digital learning hub, a $6 million digital headquarters for TAFE in NSW, opened in March this year.

Northern Tablelands MP and Minister responsible for TAFE Adam Marshall was on hand to officially push the button on the new supercomputer at the Beardy Street facility on Monday.

“It’s revolutionary for education in this state and will identify how to keep students engaged in their courses and what needs to be changed or tweaked to make learning more effective for them on an individual basis,” he said.

“The computer uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to make predictions about the types of support students need to successfully complete their studies.

“The computer also examines millions of rows of complex data to identify how to change or organise course materials to make learning more effective.

“It analyses the data students generate when they interact with TAFE’s online learning platforms and basically gives teachers a virtual picture of what course materials resonate best with different group, so then it can also look at past student behaviour to predict what current students might need by way of additional learning support for them to complete their studies successfully.”