Advanced Research in Intelligent Educational Systems (ARIES)

The ARIES lab was dedicated to the fusion of computing technology and education. The aim is to develop intelligent systems to support human learning that can adapt to the interests and abilities of an individual learner, as well as developing tools that enable human educators to engage with their students using technology.

Notable Research Accomplishments

ARIES was founded in 1988 as the Department of Computer Science’s first topic-specific research laboratory by Gord McCalla and Jim Greer, just after Jim came to the University of Saskatchewan. It formally closed in September 2018, following the graduation of Gord’s final Ph.D. student and Jim’s untimely passing. Other faculty members of the laboratory over its 30 years were the late John Cooke as well as Julita Vassileva and Ralph Deters. ARIES became an internationally recognized centre for work on intelligent learning environments, especially in research communities such as Artificial Intelligence in Education (AIED), Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS), User Modeling, Adaptation, and Personalization (UMAP), Educational Data Mining (EDM), and Learning Analytics and Knowledge (LAK). ARIES faculty members have served on program committees of key international conferences, have been members of the editorial boards of major journals, and have been instrumental in helping to develop the research communities themselves through service to international societies. Former students and research assistants are now prominent in the software industry or have gone on to their own research careers at other universities and in various places around the world.

Listed here are some of the highlights of 3 decades of ARIES research, projects that have had major impact on AIED, UMAP and other research areas.

  • Instructional planning
  • Intelligent advising in problem solving domains
  • Granularity-based diagnosis of learner behaviour
  • Methods for empirically evaluating learning support systems
  • PHelpS and iHelp systems to support peer help
  • Multi-agent architectures for learning environments
  • Agent negotiation protocols
  • Multi-agent multi-user modelling and decentralized user modeling approaches
  • Bayes networks for learner modelling
  • Active learner modelling
  • Ecological approach architecture: just-in-time and context-dependent response to learner needs
  • Smart recommendation for an evolving e-learning system
  • Privacy in user and learner modelling
  • Social capital in virtual learning communities
  • Simulation as a key technology for designing and testing learning systems
  • Data mining and learning analytics in support of learning systems and university learning needs
  • Support for professional and lifelong learning
  • Gamified learning environments and personalization
  • Tailoring of persuasive technologies for learner engagement
  • And many more!

Current Research Projects

Research projects in advanced learning technology and personalization continue under the direction of Julita Vassileva and Ralph Deters in the MADMUC laboratory.

Faculty

  • Dr. Gordon McCalla (Professor Emeritus)
  • Dr. Jim Greer (deceased)
  • Dr. Julita Vassileva
  • Dr. Ralph Deters
  • For further information about ARIES, its research heritage, and specific research projects carried out in the ARIES laboratory, please contact Gord McCalla, mccalla@cs.usask.ca