A look at what’s been happening to and for students around the world.<\/p>\n
Mexico\u2019s National University admits 12-year-old student<\/strong><\/p>\n Mexico\u2019s National Autonomous University ( better known as the UNAM) says it has admitted a 12-year-old student to its undergraduate degree program in biomedical physics.<\/p>\n Carlos Santamaria Diaz<\/a> is the youngest student to be accepted in the university\u2019s nearly 100 year history. When he was just nine years old, he participated in university programs in analytical chemistry, biochemistry and biology. He has\u00a0passed the entrance exam and has already done preparatory study at the university\u2019s school of chemistry in its genetics sciences center.\u00a0The university has stated that there would be no special privileges or benefits and that he would be treated like any other student – Read the story on the Associated Press<\/a> site.<\/p>\n Chinese campuses use facial recognition software as a ‘security measure’<\/strong><\/p>\n As more and more Chinese universities opt to use facial recognition software to improve security, concerns are growing that it is being used to monitor students and teachers. For now one of the main reasons for campus facial recognition is to spot \u2018ghost writers\u2019 trying to sit exams for other students.<\/p>\n Facial scanning equipment has been installed in about a quarter of the 38,000 college entrance exam sites in Jiangsu province ahead of the June exam (gaokao) which will be used to cross-reference a scanned image with the student\u2019s identity card image and photograph, which were filed with the student\u2019s\u00a0gaokao\u00a0application.<\/p>\n In a trial that that started in June, Beijing’s Peking University began screening students by using a camera to scan their faces to see if the technology can replace the use of university identity cards.\u00a0Facial recognition devices have already been installed outside the university\u2019s libraries, classrooms, student accommodation, sports facilities and computer centres.<\/p>\n Tsinghua University has taken it further and uses facial recognition for all visitors. Registration via China\u2019s WeChat messaging platform is required; the person registering\u00a0 uses a mobile phone app to scan their face and has to supply national identity card details. Those who do not provide details in advance may not be permitted to enter the grounds.<\/p>\n Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, stated that it was\u00a0not entirely clear what happens to all of the data being collected. \u201cCampuses are of particular interest given that they are seen as \u2018hotbeds of radicalism\u2019\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0She noted that the state has an obligation to provide public security, \u201cso if it is not just about greater surveillance, it can be defensible, but I\u2019m not sure that there is a legitimate, credible public security threat that warrants that kind of response on a university campus,\u201d she said, noting that crime on Chinese campuses is very low. – Read more on this story on the University World News<\/a> site<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A look at what’s been happening to and for students around the world. Mexico\u2019s National University admits 12-year-old student Mexico\u2019s National Autonomous University ( better known as the UNAM) says it has admitted a 12-year-old student to its undergraduate degree program in biomedical physics. Carlos Santamaria Diaz is the youngest student to be accepted in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":4711,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[66,310,30,246,59,68],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6755"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentnews.africa\/sng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}