BB4All - School Aid Robot with Anti Bullying Capability
Why build a school aid robot? Iāve always hated bullying or anything related to bullying. Iāve never been bullied, but some of my close friends have. To see my close friends struggling with bullying, and how it affected them mentally got me searching for a solution.
I started thinking of different ways to come up with something that could at least try to prevent bullying. After searching online I came across smartwatches that can activate and notify the school staff. I loved the idea and I decided to combine this with my passion for building robots. Immediately, I started developing my project plan of making an anti-bullying robot that responds to an alert from a smartwatch.
I first decided to design a watch for each student. The watch has a pulse sensor, a panic button, and an i-beacon (long-distance Bluetooth). I then searched for a way for the robot to find the studentās location and respond, so if there is a sudden increase in the studentās heartbeat or the student presses the panic button, it can go to the student to help. I learned I could do this by adding a ābeaconā system where I could give the coordinates directly both to the robot and the school staff. I also learned that I would have to add a triangulation system to do so, but as it is a little too advanced for me I decided to do it with an i-beacon on the watch, gateways, and a line-following sensor.Ā Ā
I had solved how to find the studentās location, I presented my idea to my friends. I was happy when they liked it and gave me great feedback about my robot. As a result, I also decided to add some other features like students being able to ask questions to the robot about our grades and classes.
My robot can tell the students their grades, answer the studentās questions, give out last-minute homework, and notify students about the latest events in the school. What excited me the most is that I installed a face detection system on my robot so it can detect the studentās faces, greet them by their names, ask them how they are, and act according to the answer it receives.Ā
I built it in 8 months, and after it was finished it was time to give it a name. My parents and I got together and tried to come up with creative ideas. We finally came up with BB4All, which is the abbreviation of Best Buddy For All and I especially like the āAlā at the end as BB4All has AI capabilities.
I am currently working on connecting BB4All to school databases such as Google
Classrooms so that students can get grade information etc. and make appointments with teachers/staff directly via BB4All. I am also working on indoor positioning to replace the line following the system.
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BB4All and I won first place in a robotic competition, and we have travelled to many events and showcases together.