By Katherine Ouellette | MIT Open Learning

MIT Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education (RAISE) recently celebrated the second annual Day of AI with two flagship local events. The Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the U.S. Senate in Boston hosted a human rights and data policy-focused event that was streamed worldwide. Dearborn STEM Academy in Roxbury, Massachusetts, hosted a student workshop in collaboration with Amazon Future Engineer. With over 8,000 registrations across all 50 U.S. states and 108 countries in 2023, participation in Day of AI has more than doubled since its inaugural year.

Day of AI is a free curriculum of lessons and hands-on activities designed to teach kids of all ages and backgrounds the basics and responsible use of artificial intelligence, designed by researchers at MIT RAISE. This year, resources were available for educators to run at any time and in any increments they chose. The curriculum included five new modules to address timely topics like ChatGPT in School, Teachable Machines, AI and Social Media, Data Science and Me, and more. A collaboration with the International Society for Technology in Education also introduced modules for early elementary students. Educators across the world shared photos, videos, and stories of their students’ engagement, expressing excitement and even relief over the accessible lessons.

Professor Cynthia Breazeal, director of RAISE, dean for digital learning at MIT, and head of the MIT Media Lab’s Personal Robots research group, said, “It’s been a year of extraordinary advancements in AI, and with that comes necessary conversations and concerns about who and what this technology is for. With our Day of AI events, we want to celebrate the teachers and students who are putting in the work to make sure that AI is for everyone.”

Reflecting community values and protecting digital citizens

MIT President Sally Kornbluth welcomed students from Warren Prescott Middle School and New Mission High School to the Day of AI program at the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate. Kornbluth reflected on the exciting potential of AI, along with the ethical considerations society needs to be responsible for.

“AI has the potential to do all kinds of fantastic things, including driving a car, helping us with the climate crisis, improving health care, and designing apps that we can’t even imagine yet. But what we have to make sure it doesn’t do is cause harm to individuals, to communities, to us — society as a whole,” she said.

This theme resonated with each of the event speakers, whose jobs spanned the sectors of education, government, and business. Yo Deshpande, technologist for the public realm, and Michael Lawrence Evans, program director of new urban mechanics from the Boston Mayor’s Office, shared how Boston thinks about using AI to improve city life in ways that are “equitable, accessible, and delightful.” Deshpande said, “We have the opportunity to explore not only how AI works, but how using AI can line up with our values, the way we want to be in the world, and the way we want to be in our community.”

Adam L’Italien, chief innovation officer at Liberty Mutual Insurance (one of Day of AI’s founding sponsors), compared our present moment with AI technologies to the early days of personal computers and internet connection. “Exposure to emerging technologies can accelerate progress in the world and in your own lives,” L’Italien said, while recognizing that the AI development process needs to be inclusive and mitigate biases.

Human policies for artificial intelligence

So how does society address these human rights concerns about AI? Marc Aidinoff ’21, former White House Office of Science and Technology Policy chief of staff, led a discussion on how government policy can influence the parameters of how technology is developed and used, like the Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights. Aidinoff said, “The work of building the world you want to see is far harder than building the technical AI system … How do you work with other people and create a collective vision for what we want to do?” Warren Prescott Middle School students described how AI could be used to solve problems that humans couldn’t. But they also shared their concerns that AI could affect data privacy, learning deficits, social media addiction, job displacement, and propaganda.

In a mock U.S. Senate trial activity designed by Daniella DiPaola, PhD student at the MIT Media Lab, the middle schoolers investigated what rights might be undermined by AI in schools, hospitals, law enforcement, and corporations. Meanwhile, New Mission High School students workshopped the ideas behind bill S.2314, the Social Media Addiction Reduction Technology (SMART) Act, in an activity designed by Raechel Walker, graduate research assistant in the Personal Robots Group, and Matt Taylor, research assistant at the Media Lab. They discussed what level of control could or should be introduced at the parental, educational, and governmental levels to reduce the risks of internet addiction.

“Alexa, how do I program AI?”

At Dearborn STEM Academy, Amazon Future Engineer helped students work through the Intro to Voice AI curriculum module in real-time. Students used MIT App Inventor to code basic commands for Alexa. In an interview with WCVB, Principal Darlene Marcano said, “It’s important that we expose our students to as many different experiences as possible. The students that are participating are on track to be future computer scientists and engineers.”

Breazeal told Dearborn students, “We want you to have an informed voice about how you want AI to be used in society. We want you to feel empowered that you can shape the world. You can make things with AI to help make a better world and a better community.”

Rohit Prasad ’08, senior vice president and head scientist for Alexa at Amazon, and Victor Reinoso ’97, global director of philanthropic education initiatives at Amazon, also joined the event. “Amazon and MIT share a commitment to helping students discover a world of possibilities through STEM and AI education,” said Reinoso. "There’s a lot of current excitement around the technological revolution with generative AI and large language models, so we’re excited to help students explore careers of the future and navigate the pathways available to them.” To highlight their continued investment in the local community and the school program, Amazon donated a $25,000 Innovation and Early College Pathways Program Grant to the Boston Public School system.

Day of AI down under

Not only was the Day of AI program widely adopted across the globe, Australian educators were inspired to adapt their own regionally specific curriculum. An estimated 161,000 AI professionals will be needed in Australia by 2030, according to the National Artificial Intelligence Center in the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), an Australian government agency and Day of AI Australia project partner. CSIRO worked with the University of New South Wales to develop supplementary educational resources on AI ethics and machine learning. Day of AI Australia reached 85,000 students at 400-plus secondary schools this year, sparking curiosity in the next generation of AI experts.

The interest in AI is accelerating as fast as the technology is being developed. Day of AI offers a unique opportunity for K-12 students to shape our world’s digital future and their own.

“I hope that some of you will decide to be part of this bigger effort to help us figure out the best possible answers to questions that are raised by AI,” Kornbluth told students at the Edward M. Kennedy Institute. “We’re counting on you, the next generation, to learn how AI works and help make sure it’s for everyone.”