Overview
- Salamanca City Central has purchased a seated M‑Series humanoid named Sally from Realbotix and plans a fall pilot that pairs the in‑class robot with an Optio avatar for 24/7 homework help.
- Realbotix and district officials say Sally will run on a closed system with no facial recognition or recording, use student ID codes for personalization, default to 'I don't know' for uncertain answers, and alert administrators for flagged safety terms.
- The robot has lifelike silicone skin, long brown hair, limited upper‑body movement and expressive faces, and the Optio avatar will let students upload work and get multilingual support outside school hours.
- Critics point to Realbotix's corporate history tied to RealDoll and Tokens.com, and warn the pilot risks privacy gaps, biased or inaccurate AI answers, and the inappropriate commercialization of a resource‑constrained, majority low‑income district.
- The district paid $57,590 for the deployment, a discounted rate Realbotix says is below a $95,000 list price, and observers say independent evaluation, community input and clear learning metrics are needed before expansion.