Realbotix humanoid robot and Optio AI teaching assistant begin pilot at Salamanca City Central School District

Salamanca City Central School District, in Cattaraugus County, New York, is piloting a Realbotix humanoid robot alongside an AI teaching assistant called Optio, with a full-scale rollout to about 500 high school students planned for September 2026, New York Focus reported on July 14, 2026. Realbotix Corp., a Las Vegas-based robotics company, first announced the partnership on June 24, 2026, and the district expects the robot, nicknamed “Sally” by staff, on site by mid-July to support summer STEM camps ahead of the fall expansion, according to GovTech’s report on the pilot.

Salamanca is the only incorporated city in the United States located entirely within a Native American reservation, sitting on the Seneca Nation Reservation. The district serves roughly 1,300 students, 32 percent of whom identify as American Indian or Alaska Native and 79 percent of whom are classified as economically disadvantaged, New York Focus reported. Superintendent Dr. Mark Beehler said the district pursued the AI teaching assistant robot partly because banning AI tools outright had proven unworkable.

“Many schools are taking the easy solution of simply banning it, but I have found that students will find a way around most rules that schools put in place,” Beehler told New York Focus. “I also believe it is critical for schools to teach proper use of technology, not simply exclude it.”

What Optio and the humanoid robot do

Optio is Realbotix’s AI-powered teacher’s assistant and at-home tutor. Students log into a website to access a personalized avatar trained on district curriculum, which offers concept reinforcement, individual tutoring and homework support around the clock in more than 100 languages, according to Realbotix’s announcement and GovTech’s reporting. Students can upload photos of homework for feedback or ask the avatar to generate practice material. The physical M-Series humanoid robot, seated and stationary but capable of upper-body movement and facial expressions, is intended mainly for classroom engagement and demonstrations rather than mobile tutoring.

The district paired the technology with its status as a Woz ED STEM Pathway school, a curriculum program developed with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. The initial rollout supports students in Woz ED AI and Robotics courses before expanding to the wider high school population in the fall.

Guardrails, privacy and cost

Beehler said the robot and avatar run on a closed system that is not connected to the internet and has no access to personally identifiable student information, and that Realbotix built in guardrails over several months to keep conversations on educational topics. “It has essentially its own brain and what it knows is what we’ve told it,” he told GovTech. “It has guardrails of topics that it can’t talk about, and if students try to venture that way, it will redirect them onto the teaching and learning that should be occurring.” New York Focus reported that mentions of self-harm or similar flagged terms automatically alert school administrators, and that the robot has no facial recognition or recording capability, in line with state requirements.

The district’s contract with Realbotix is valued at $57,590, according to a signed agreement reviewed by New York Focus through the school board’s public records; Realbotix’s website separately lists the M-Series robot’s standard price at $95,000. CEO Andrew Kiguel framed the tool as a way to extend tutoring access to students who could not otherwise afford it. “Not every parent can afford a tutor at $50 an hour,” he told GovTech. “This provides similar benefit to having a tutor, but it is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, whenever that student needs it.”

Source: BusinessWire, June 24, 2026; GlobeNewswire, June 24, 2026; GovTech/The Buffalo News, July 7, 2026; New York Focus, July 14, 2026.

Not everyone in the community supports the plan. “We already have so many issues in our community, including environmental issues. I just don’t understand the concept of adding AI onto that,” Salamanca parent Sierra Abrams told New York Focus. Ryan Schaaf, an associate professor of educational technology at Notre Dame of Maryland University, told the outlet that shielding students from AI tools carries its own risk: “It gives students a true disadvantage because once they leave school, they are going to be immersed in AI technologies.” Beehler said the goal is not to replace instruction. “We truly believe in the importance of human-to-human interaction, so there is absolutely no way that we will allow devices like this or humanoids to replace teachers,” he told GovTech, a point echoed in the district’s broader approach to AI in education, where research favors tools that support rather than substitute for teachers.

About Realbotix

Realbotix Corp. is a robotics and artificial intelligence company based in Las Vegas that develops humanoid robots and AI systems designed for interaction, according to its own company materials. New York Focus reported that Realbotix was formerly known as Tokens.com, a company that had let customers use cryptocurrency to rent virtual land in the metaverse, before acquiring Simulcra, the Las Vegas parent company of RealDoll, in April 2024. A Realbotix spokesperson told New York Focus that Realbotix and RealDoll do not share employees, payroll, physical locations or technology. On February 12, 2026, Nasdaq-listed Onconetix, Inc. entered a definitive agreement to acquire Realbotix LLC in an all-stock transaction intended to bring the robotics business to Nasdaq, with completion expected in the second half of 2026. The Salamanca pilot is Realbotix’s first placement of a humanoid robot and AI teaching assistant inside a working U.S. public school district, tying directly into the district’s stated aim of giving students supervised, structured exposure to AI tools rather than encountering them unsupervised outside school, as covered in prior reporting on humanoid robots in classrooms.

Sources: New York Focus; BusinessWire; GovTech / The Buffalo News

Featured image: photo by Magda Ehlers on Pexels (free Pexels license).

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Figen Sekin

I specialize in sustainability education, curriculum co-creation, and early-stage project strategy. At WINSS, I craft articles on sustainability, transformative AI, and related topics. When I’m not writing, you’ll find me chasing the perfect sushi roll, exploring cities around the globe, or unwinding with my dog Puffy — the world’s most loyal sidekick.