On May 7th, it was reported on the official website of the Ministry of Education that the first batch of 18 "Artificial Intelligence + Higher Education" exemplary application scenarios have been officially released. Beihang University, known as Beihang for short, was successfully selected for its AI-empowered programming education platform called "'Code-On' - Intelligent Teaching Application Platform Empowered by Large Models."
Programming education is the foundation of cultivating software talents, which are in high demand in society. Recently, the "China Enterprise Recruitment Salary Report for the First Quarter of 2024" released by Zhaopin showed that the average salary for computer software professionals is 12,044 yuan per month, ranking among the top 3 industries in terms of recruitment salary in the first quarter of 2024.
However, the shortage of software teaching staff and varying teaching abilities among teachers are pain points in schools at all levels. Through research, Beihang University found that students commonly face issues such as easy theoretical learning but challenging programming assignments, and difficulties in receiving timely assistance for their problems. Teachers are often overloaded with students, lacking the time and energy to focus on each individual and address numerous questions. The inability to promptly meet students' needs and solve their difficulties gradually diminishes their enthusiasm for learning, significantly impacting the effectiveness of programming education.
To address this pain point, Beihang University developed the "Code-On" programming education platform based on the domestic iFLYTEK Xinghuo large model, pioneering the exploration of large model-empowered programming education in universities. In December 2023, Beihang initiated an experiment in large model-empowered programming education based on "Code-On."
With powerful capabilities such as code correction, code explanation, and code generation provided by the large model, "Code-On" effectively reduces the burden of programming teaching for teachers, enhances students' learning efficiency, and efficiently empowers the cultivation of software talents. In January of this year, Beihang University President Xu Kun showcased the "Code-On" intelligent programming education application platform at the 2024 World Digital Education Conference, receiving significant acclaim.
Since its launch, "Code-On" has been continuously collecting data, accumulating experiences, and undergoing rapid iterative upgrades in sync with iFLYTEK Xinghuo, with a major version upgrade every 2 to 3 months on average. As of April 15, 2024, Beihang University has offered 107 courses and established 118 classes based on "Code-On." Data indicates that "Code-On" can provide high-quality/accurate guidance on programming issues for programming novices (comprising over 80% of the student population), with a success rate of 60% to 80% after code modifications, significantly alleviating teachers' workload.
"'Code-On' can inspire students to discover and solve code problems on their own, master programming knowledge and skills, rather than providing direct final answers, aligning more with the requirements of programming education," said a relevant person in charge at Beihang University. It is expected that by the end of this year, "Code-On" will achieve an accuracy rate of 80% to 90% in answering programming questions for novice programmers.
It is understood that the national version of "Code-On," named "iFLYTEK Xinghuo Code-On," plans to be promoted nationwide this year and aims to support teaching experiments in over 500 universities.
