Summer School 2027

AARC Summer School

on Robotics & Automation in Africa

An initiative to promote robotics education and research in South Africa and across the continent - filling a critical gap for early-stage robotics researchers.

About

About the Initiative

The field of robotics is steadily growing in South Africa, which is home to some of the largest robotics and machine learning labs in Africa. Despite this, there are currently no active summer schools aimed at early-stage robotics researchers. The AARC Summer School is poised to fill this important gap - bringing together graduate students, researchers, and practitioners for an intensive programme of keynotes, tutorials, and hands-on sessions.

The school will take place in August/September 2027. We aim to co-locate with the Deep Learning Indaba, with whom the organising committee has an existing relationship and which is expected to take place in South Africa next year. By co-locating with the largest ongoing machine learning and AI conference in Africa, we hope to expand the reach of our school to include participants from across the continent - promoting robotics education and building a research community on a much larger scale.

At a Glance

When: August/September 2027 (exact dates TBC)
Where: South Africa
Duration: 3 days
Target Audience: Graduate students with a background in ML/AI

Areas of Interest

What to expect

The summer school will cover foundational and cutting-edge areas in robotics and automation. Exact topics and session details will be confirmed as the programme is finalized.

ROS2 and Robotics Foundations

Essential tools and frameworks for modern robotics development

Robot Control and Autonomy

Techniques for enabling autonomous robot decision-making and control

Perception and Sensor Integration

Processing sensor data for robot understanding of the environment

SLAM and Navigation

Simultaneous localization, mapping, and autonomous navigation

Behaviour Design and Decision-Making

Cognitive and intelligent robotics, planning, and reasoning

Sim-to-Real Transfer

Bridging simulation and real-world robot deployment

HRI and Natural Language Interaction

Human-robot interaction and language-based communication

Real-World Robotics Applications

Practical deployments across industries, agriculture, and service sectors

Programme & Schedule

Three-day agenda

The programme features keynote lectures, hands-on sessions, panel discussions, and networking opportunities. Daily sessions run from 08:30 to 17:00. This schedule is tentative and subject to change.

Time	Day 1	Day 2	Day 3
08:30 – 09:00	Registration	Registration	Registration
09:00 – 09:30	Registration	Keynote	Keynote
09:30 – 10:00	Welcome Session	Keynote	Keynote
10:00 – 10:30	Coffee Break
10:30 – 11:00	Keynote	Hands-on Session: Robot Perception	Poster Session
11:00 – 11:30	Keynote
11:30 – 12:00	Hands-on Session: Introduction to ROS
12:00 – 12:30		Keynote	Keynote
12:30 – 13:00		Keynote	Keynote
13:00 – 13:30	Lunch Break
13:30 – 14:00	Lunch Break
14:00 – 14:30	Keynote	Keynote	Keynote
14:30 – 15:00	Keynote	Keynote	Keynote
15:00 – 15:30	Hands-on Session: Robot Learning Challenge Robotics lab visit: Visit to the Wits University RAIL Lab	Panel Discussion	Hands-on Session: RoboCup
15:30 – 16:00
16:00 – 16:30
16:30 – 17:00			Closing Session

Speakers

Potential Speakers

The school will feature 8 keynote talks and a panel session. The tentative list of speakers is as follows.

Amir Patel

Biomechanics · Robotics

Associate Professor at UCL studying how animals achieve agility and speed, applying those insights to robotics. His work spans sensor fusion, computer vision, and optimal control for measuring and modelling locomotion, with applications in ecology, disease monitoring, and sports science.

Benjamin Rosman

RL · Intelligence

Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand and founding Director of the MIND Institute. Runs the RAIL Laboratory and serves as Chief Science Officer of Lelapa AI, building AI for Africans, by Africans.

David Vernon

Cognitive Robotics

Over forty years in robotics and twenty in cognitive robotics. Technical coordinator behind the iCub open-source cognitive humanoid robot, founding co-chair of the IEEE RAS Technical Committee for Cognitive Robotics, and author of four books on robotics and cognitive systems.

George Konidaris

AI · Robot Intelligence

Associate Professor of Computer Science and director of the Intelligent Robot Lab at Brown University. Co-founder of Realtime Robotics and Lelapa AI. His research focuses on understanding the fundamental computational processes that generate intelligence and using them to design a generally-intelligent robot.

Paul Amayo

Robotics · Education

Senior Lecturer and Principal Investigator at the University of Cape Town with broad experience from self-driving cars in the UK to para-transit in Kenya. Passionate about advancing technology through research and ensuring its adoption in communities where it would do the most good.

Pravesh Ranchod

Skill Discovery · LfD

Works in Learning from Demonstration with a focus on Skill Discovery - decomposing expert demonstrations into reusable component skills. Also interested in technological aids for education and healthcare in under-resourced environments such as South Africa.

Riaan Stopforth

Search & Rescue · Prosthetics

Associate Professor at the University of KwaZulu-Natal heading the Stopforth Mechatronics, Robotics and Research Lab. Known for bridging advanced robotics with practical implementation through the Touch Hand project. Chair of the IEEE South Africa Joint RA/CS Chapter.

Steven James

RL · Representation Learning

Senior Lecturer and Deputy Director of the RAIL Lab at the University of the Witwatersrand. Interested in developing generally intelligent agents capable of learning their own representations of tasks for planning.

Benedict Quartey

LLMs · Robot Instruction

PhD from Brown University working on robotics and machine learning, including the use of LLMs for robot instruction. Interned at the Boston Dynamics AI Institute and served as Faculty Engagement Chair for the Deep Learning Indaba. Co-founder of Papermap AI.

Branden Ingram

ML · Games · Robotics

Lecturer in Computer Science at the University of the Witwatersrand. His research sits at the intersection of machine learning, video games, and robotics. Contributes to the RAIL Lab and MIND Institute, and co-leads the Wits RoboCup team.

Additional keynote speakers and tutorial leads will be announced as the programme is finalised. If you are interested in speaking or leading a session, please reach out via our Discord or email.

Organising Committee

The team making it happen

The summer school is being organized by dedicated researchers and community builders committed to advancing robotics education and research across Africa.