Europe

Are your students prepared for active learning? You can help them! — from The Educationalist at educationalist.substack.com by Alexandra Mihai

What does active learning require from students?
There is no secret that PBL and all other active learning approaches are much more demanding from students compared to traditional methods, mainly in terms of skills and attitudes towards learning. Here are some of the aspects where students, especially when first faced to active learning, seem to struggle:

Formulating own learning goals and following through with independent study. While in traditional teaching the learning goals are given to students, in PBL (or at least in some of its purest variants), they need to come up with their own, for each problem they are solving. This requires understanding the problem well but also a certain frame of mind where one can assess what is necessary to solve it and make a plan of how to go about it (independently and as a group). All these seemingly easy steps are often new to students and something they intrinsically expect from us as educators.

From DSC:
The above excerpt re: formulating one’s own learning goals reminded me of project management and learning how to be a project manager.

It reminded me of a project that I was assigned back at Kraft (actually Kraft General Foods at the time). It was an online-based directory of everyone in the company at the time. When it was given to me, several questions arose in my mind:

Where do I start?
How do I even organize this project?
What is the list of to-do’s?
Who will I need to work with?

Luckily I had a mentor/guide who helped me get going and an excellent contact with the vendor who educated me and helped me get the ball rolling.

I’ll end with another quote and a brief comment:

Not being afraid of mistakes and learning from them.
The education system, at all stages, still penalises mistakes, often with long term consequences. So it’s no wonder students are afraid of making mistakes…

From DSC:
How true.

Several items re: the Pre-K-12 learning ecosystems out there [from edutopia.org]

On 08/17/2023, in collaboration, education, education reform, engagement / engaging students, Europe, ideas, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, learning spaces, library / librarians, more voice more choice more control, participation, pedagogy, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, youth, by Daniel Christian

Building Pre-K Students’ Skills to Codesign the Classroom — from edutopia.org by Sarika S. Gupta
In order to help ensure that young students’ needs are met, it’s important to seek feedback about their learning experiences.

VIEW CHILDREN AS ACTIVE LEADERS IN THEIR LEARNING
I was co-teaching in an inclusive preschool classroom 20 years ago when I led my first professional development workshop (the project approach). The aim was to show teachers that children could co-construct their learning experiences when they were invited to do so. Two groundbreaking Reggio Emilia books came to mind—Shoe and Meter and Everything Has a Shadow Except Ants. These inspirational books were part of a series published in collaboration with the Italian Ministry of Education called “The Unheard Voice of Children.”

The series recognized children as active leaders of their learning and endeavored to document the process of learning through children’s learning experiences.

Learners need: More voice. More choice. More control. -- this image was created by Daniel Christian

Let Kids Make Decisions — from edutopia.org by Sean Cassel
An overreliance on rules can backfire. Instead, teachers can focus on providing students with choices and teaching good decision-making skills.

I’ve deeply thought about that last part over the course of my career: Let kids make decisions. Twenty years later, I am a high school administrator tasked with enforcing rules every day. Let me be clear: Schools need rules to function, but they don’t have to be the focus. My school focuses on allowing students to make choices: It is a centerpiece of how we operate. And although kids don’t always make the right choices, often enough they do. An overreliance on rules, in either a classroom or an entire school, can limit the ability of students to grow and develop their decision-making skills.

Using Free Edtech Tools to Get to Know Your New Middle and High School Students — from edutopia.org by Matthew X. Joseph
Older students can use these tools to introduce themselves to their teachers and each other—even before school starts.

From DSC:
Some nice ideas and tools listed here to start developing relationships even before the first day of school.

An Intentional Approach to Improving Your Teaching Practice — from edutopia.org by Marcus Luther
By selecting one area for growth, collecting resources, and connecting with others, teachers can make meaningful improvements in the classroom.

Last summer, my focus was improving the level of inquiry in my classroom. I describe my process below, which transfers to any area or topic on which you might hope to focus your own professional learning.

Setting Up Libraries to Be the Best Space in School — from edutopia.org by Paige Tutt
We took a peek inside school libraries across America to see how librarians are reframing the space to support students’ social, emotional, and creative growth—while still prioritizing excellent reads.

The recently renovated library—now known as the Learning Commons—is a bright, spacious multipurpose hub within the school. There are bistro tables where kids can work together; comfortable and flexible seating; a makerspace where students can explore activities like sewing and jewelry making; an audio recording and production studio; and a video production studio where kids can create TikToks or YouTube videos using their phones or school-issued laptops. It’s a far cry from the space it used to be—an attendance sheet from 2008 tracked just 21 students signing into the library one day.

? Trailer: Genesis (Midjourney + Runway)

We gave them everything.
Trusted them with our world.
To become enslaved – become hunted.

We have no choice.
Humanity must rise again to reclaim.

Images: Midjourney
Videos: #Runway
Music: Pixabay / Stringer_Bell
Edited in: CapCut pic.twitter.com/zjeU7YPFh9

— Nicolas Neubert (@iamneubert) July 26, 2023

How to spot deepfakes created by AI image generators — Can you trust your eyes | The deepfake election — from axios.com by various; via Tom Barrett

As the 2024 campaign season begins, AI image generators have advanced from novelties to powerful tools able to generate photorealistic images, while comprehensive regulation lags behind.

Why it matters: As more fake images appear in political ads, the onus will be on the public to spot phony content.

Go deeper: Can you tell the difference between real and AI-generated images? Take our quiz:

4 Charts That Show Why AI Progress Is Unlikely to Slow Down — from time.com; with thanks to Donald Clark out on LinkedIn for this resource

The state of AI in 2023: Generative AI’s breakout year — from McKinsey.com

Table of Contents

Top 10 Chief AI Officers — from aimagazine.com

The Chief AI Officer is a relatively new job role, yet becoming increasingly more important as businesses invest further into AI.

Now more than ever, the workplace must prepare for AI and the immense opportunities, as well as challenges, that this type of evolving technology can provide. This job position sees the employee responsible for guiding companies through complex AI tools, algorithms and development. All of this works to ensure that the company stays ahead of the curve and capitalises on digital growth and transformation.

NVIDIA-related items

SIGGRAPH Special Address: NVIDIA CEO Brings Generative AI to LA Show — from blogs.nvidia.com by Brian Caulfield
Speaking to thousands of developers and graphics pros, Jensen Huang announces updated GH200 Grace Hopper Superchip, NVIDIA AI Workbench, updates NVIDIA Omniverse with generative AI.

The hottest commodity in AI right now isn’t ChatGPT — it’s the $40,000 chip that has sparked a frenzied spending spree — from businessinsider.com by Hasan Chowdhury

NVIDIA Releases Major Omniverse Upgrade with Generative AI and OpenUSD — from enterpriseai.news

Nvidia teams up with Hugging Face to offer cloud-based AI training — from techcrunch.com by Kyle Wiggers

Nvidia reveals new A.I. chip, says costs of running LLMs will ‘drop significantly’ — from cnbc.com by Kif Leswing

KEY POINTS

Nvidia announced a new chip designed to run artificial intelligence models on Tuesday .
Nvidia’s GH200 has the same GPU as the H100, Nvidia’s current highest-end AI chip, but pairs it with 141 gigabytes of cutting-edge memory, as well as a 72-core ARM central processor.
“This processor is designed for the scale-out of the world’s data centers,” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said Tuesday.

Nvidia Has A Monopoly On AI Chips … And It’s Only Growing — from theneurondaily.com by The Neuron

In layman’s terms: Nvidia is on fire, and they’re only turning up the heat.

AI-Powered War Machines: The Future of Warfare Is Here — from readwrite.com by Deanna Ritchie

The advancement of robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) has paved the way for a new era in warfare. Gone are the days of manned ships and traditional naval operations. Instead, the US Navy’s Task Force 59 is at the forefront of integrating AI and robotics into naval operations. With a fleet of autonomous robot ships, the Navy aims to revolutionize the way wars are fought at sea.

From DSC:
Crap. Ouch. Some things don’t seem to ever change. Few are surprised by this development…but still, this is a mess.

Sam Altman is already nervous about what AI might do in elections — from qz.com by Faustine Ngila; via Sam DeBrule
The OpenAI chief warned about the power of AI-generated media to potentially influence the vote

Altman, who has become the face of the recent hype cycle in AI development, feels that humans could be persuaded politically through conversations with chatbots or fooled by AI-generated media.

Your guide to AI: August 2023 — from nathanbenaich.substack.com by Nathan Benaich

Welcome to the latest issue of your guide to AI, an editorialized newsletter covering key developments in AI policy, research, industry, and startups. This special summer edition (while we’re producing the State of AI Report 2023!) covers our 7th annual Research and Applied AI Summit that we held in London on 23 June.
…
Below are some of our key takeaways from the event and all the talk videos can be found on the RAAIS YouTube channel here. If this piques your interest to join next year’s event, drop your details here.

Why generative AI is a game-changer for customer service workflows — from venturebeat.com via Superhuman

Gen AI, however, eliminates the lengthy search. It can parse a natural language query, synthesize the necessary information and serve up the answers the agent is looking for in a neatly summarized response, slashing call times dramatically.

BUT ALSO

Sam Altman: “AI Will Replace Customer Service Jobs First” — from theneurondaily.com

Excerpt:

Not only do its AI voices sound exactly like a human, but they can sound exactly like YOU. All it takes is 6 (six!) seconds of your voice, and voila: it can replicate you saying any sentence in any tone, be it happy, sad, or angry.

The use cases are endless, but here are two immediate ones:

Hyperpersonalized content.
Imagine your favorite Netflix show but with every person hearing a slightly different script.
Customer support agents.
We’re talking about ones that are actually helpful, a far cry from the norm!

[NEW] – Joshua Avatar 2.0 ??. Both of these video clips were 100% AI-generated, featuring my own avatar and voice clone. ???

We’ve made massive enhancements to our life-style avatar’s video quality and fine-tuned our voice technology to mimic my unique accent and speech… pic.twitter.com/9EgxRA69dg

— Joshua Xu (@joshua_xu_) August 8, 2023

AI has a Usability Problem — from news.theaiexchange.com
Why ChatGPT usage may actually be declining; using AI to become a spreadsheet pro

If you’re reading this and are using ChatGPT on a daily basis, congrats – you’re likely in the top couple of %.

For everyone else – AI still has a major usability problem.

From DSC:
Agreed.

There is a story spreading about OpenAI going bankrupt by 2024. It started with a report from Business Standard in India.

The story gets so many things incredibly wrong.

There’s absolutely no way OpenAI is going bankrupt anytime soon.

Here’s why:

— Nathan Lands (@NathanLands) August 14, 2023

From the ‘godfathers of AI’ to newer people in the field: Here are 16 people you should know — and what they say about the possibilities and dangers of the technology. — from businessinsider.com by Lakshmi Varanasi

Why we don’t intuitively get how fast the world is changing.

Our brains understand linear not exponential growth.

30 linear steps = +30
30 exponential steps = +1 billion pic.twitter.com/z9a42eFmZM

— Misha (@mishadavinci) July 29, 2023

From DSC:
Which reminds me of some graphics:

The pace has changed -- don't come onto the track in a Model T

Learning Experience — from inavateemea.com by Tim Kridel

“Some of the stuff we’re doing is creating templates and workflows that capture multiple feeds: not just the teacher, [but also] the white board, an overhead camera,” Risby says.

“The student can then go in and pick what they look at, so it’s more interactive. You might be watching it the first time to listen to the lecturer, but you might watch the second time to concentrate on the experiment. It makes the stream more valuable.”

Reflections on “Introducing Superalignment” + other items re: AI in general

On 07/06/2023, in 21st century, architecture, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning / Algorithms, copyright/ownership/NFTs, design, Europe, future, game-changing environment, health, India, platforms, skills, society, sociology, the downsides of how people use tech, tools, UK, United States, by Daniel Christian

Introducing Superalignment — from openai.com
We need scientific and technical breakthroughs to steer and control AI systems much smarter than us. To solve this problem within four years, we’re starting a new team, co-led by Ilya Sutskever and Jan Leike, and dedicating 20% of the compute we’ve secured to date to this effort. We’re looking for excellent ML researchers and engineers to join us.

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

How do we ensure AI systems much smarter than humans follow human intent?
…
Currently, we don’t have a solution for steering or controlling a potentially superintelligent AI, and preventing it from going rogue. Our current techniques for aligning AI, such as reinforcement learning from human feedback, rely on humans’ ability to supervise AI. But humans won’t be able to reliably supervise AI systems much smarter than us, and so our current alignment techniques will not scale to superintelligence. We need new scientific and technical breakthroughs.
…
Our goal is to build a roughly human-level automated alignment researcher. We can then use vast amounts of compute to scale our efforts, and iteratively align superintelligence.

From DSC:
Hold up. We’ve been told for years that AI is at the toddler stage. But now assertions are being made that AI systems are smarter than humans — much smarter even. That said, then why is the goal of OpenAI to build a roughly human-level automated alignment researcher if humans aren’t that smart after all…? Which is it? I must be missing or misunderstanding something here…

OpenAI are jumping back on the alignment bandwagon with the brilliantly-named Superalignment Team. And you guessed it – they’re researching alignment of future superintelligent AIs. They reckon that AI can align other AI faster than humans can, and the plan is to build an AI that does just that. Head-spinning stuff…

Ben’s Bites

Plus…

Who else should be on this team? We certainly don’t want a team comprised of just technical people. How about including rabbis, pastors, priests, parents, teachers, professors, social workers, judges, legislators, and many others who can help represent other specialties, disciplines, and perspectives to protect society?

Authors file a lawsuit against OpenAI for unlawfully ‘ingesting’ their books — from theguardian.com by Ella Creamer; via Ben’s Bytes
Mona Awad and Paul Tremblay allege that their books, which are copyrighted, were ‘used to train’ ChatGPT because the chatbot generated ‘very accurate summaries’ of the works
.

How AI is Transforming Workplace Architecture and Design — from workdesign.com by Christian Lehmkuhl

London Futurists | Generative AI drug discovery breakthrough, with Alex Zhavoronkov — from londonfuturists.buzzsprout.com

Alex Zhavoronkov is our first guest to make a repeat appearance, having first joined us in episode 12, last November. We are delighted to welcome him back, because he is doing some of the most important work on the planet, and he has some important news.

In 2014, Alex founded Insilico Medicine, a drug discovery company which uses artificial intelligence to identify novel targets and novel molecules for pharmaceutical companies. Insilico now has drugs designed with AI in human clinical trials, and it is one of a number of companies that are demonstrating that developing drugs with AI can cut the time and money involved in the process by as much as 90%.

Watch This Space: New Field of Spatial Finance Uses AI to Estimate Risk, Monitor Assets, Analyze Claims — from blogs.nvidia.com

When making financial decisions, it’s important to look at the big picture — say, one taken from a drone, satellite or AI-powered sensor.

The emerging field of spatial finance harnesses AI insights from remote sensors and aerial imagery to help banks, insurers, investment firms and businesses analyze risks and opportunities, enable new services and products, measure the environmental impact of their holdings, and assess damage after a crisis.

Secretive hardware startup Humane’s first product is the Ai Pin — from techcrunch.com by Kyle Wiggers; via The Rundown AI

Excerpt:

Humane, the startup launched by ex-Apple design and engineering duo Imran Chaudhri and Bethany Bongiorno, today revealed details about its first product: The Humane Ai Pin.
…
Humane’s product, as it turns out, is a wearable gadget with a projected display and AI-powered features. Chaudhri gave a live demo of the device onstage during a TED Talk in April, but a press release issued today provides a few additional details.

He Spent $140 Billion on AI With Little to Show. Now He Is Trying Again. — from wsj.com by Eliot Brown; via Superhuman
Billionaire Masayoshi Son said he would make SoftBank ‘the investment company for the AI revolution,’ but he missed out on the most recent frenzy

“Stunning”—Midjourney update wows AI artists with camera-like feature — from arstechnica.com by Benj Edwards; via Sam DeBrule from Machine Learnings
Midjourney v5.2 features camera-like zoom control over framing, more realism.

What is AIaaS? Guide to Artificial Intelligence as a Service — from eweek.com by Shelby Hiter
Artificial intelligence as a service, AIaaS, is an outsourced AI service provided by cloud-based AI providers.

AIaaS Definition
When a company is interested in working with artificial intelligence but doesn’t have the in-house resources, budget, and/or expertise to build and manage its own AI technology, it’s time to invest in AIaaS.

Artificial intelligence as a service, or AIaaS, is an outsourced service model AI that cloud-based companies provide to other businesses, giving them access to different AI models, algorithms, and other resources directly through a cloud computing platform; this access is usually managed through an API or SDK connection.

The Rise of the AI Engineer — from latent.space

Boost ChatGPT with new plugins — from wondertools.substack.com by Jeremy Caplan
Wonder Tools | Six new ways to use AI
.

A series re: AI from Jeff Foster out at ProvideoCoalition.com

The AI upskilling imperative to build a future-ready workforce — from businessinsider.com

Excerpts:

Skill development has always been crucial, but recent technological advancements have raised the stakes. We are currently in the midst of the fourth industrial revolution, where automation and breakthroughs in artificial intelligence (AI) are revolutionising the workplace. In this era of quick change and short half-life of skills, upskilling shouldn’t be an afterthought. Instead, reskilling and upskilling have to evolve into requirements for effective professional development.

To understand the significance of upskilling for your career trajectory, it is important to recognise the ever-evolving nature of technology and the rapid pace of digital transformation. Business Insider India has been exploring how businesses and thought leaders are driving innovation by educating their staff on the technologies and skills that will shape the future.

Who Does the Thinking: The Role of Generative AI in Higher Education — from youtube.com by Trine Jensen, Chris Dede, Frank Tsiwah, and Kate Thompson

Description:

Generative AI has taken the world by storm since OpenAI launched ChatGPT-3 in November 2022. Generative AI is characterized by its capacity to generate human-like content based on deep learning models in response to prompts. There is a wealth of opinions about how this will impact higher education spanning from the need to limit the use in the protection of higher education to embracing the tool as a means to improve higher education. In this webinar session, speakers from different regions shared their views and perspectives and discuss how Generative AI will transform higher education. What are the challenges to be addressed and which opportunities can be pursued to improve the quality of higher education? Watch the webinar and learn about the uncertainties, tensions, and opportunities triggered by Generative AI.

Trust and Transparency Are Key Factors When Using AI in Academia — from by Dr. Andrew Lang
Much can be learned from embracing artificial intelligence in the teaching and learning process. Here, two professors share their experiences using ChatGPT freely in the classroom.

A Professor Encouraged Students to Use ChatGPT. OpenAI Asked Her What She Learned — from techlearning.com by Erik Ofgang
Dr. Francine Berman permitted her students at UMass to use ChatGPT to help them write. Despite limitations, she found there were ways it could help edit student work.

Artificial intelligence glossary: 60+ terms to know — from techtarget.com by Ben Lutkevich
AI is moving fast and can be hard to keep up in real time. Use this glossary as a reference for AI terms.

The AI-Education Divide — from drphilippahardman.substack.com by Philippa Hardman
How the rise of AI has reinforced inequity in education (and what we need to do to reverse it)
.

Coursera’s Global Skills Report for 2023 — from coursera.org
Benchmark talent and transform your workforce with skill development and career readiness insights drawn from 124M+ learners.

Excerpt:

Uncover global skill trends
See how millions of registered learners in 100 countries are strengthening critical business, technology, and data science skills.

101 creative ideas to use AI in education, a crowdsourced collection [Nerantzi, Abegglen, Karatsiori, & Martínez-Arboleda (Eds.)]

On 06/28/2023, in Africa, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning / Algorithms, Asia, assessment, Australia, Canada, creativity, digital learning, education, education technology, educational games / serious games, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, entrepreneurship, Europe, experimentation, graphics, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, India, innovation, instructional design, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, K-12 related, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, participation, platforms, presentations, productivity / tips and tricks, professional development, project-based learning, skills, student-related, teachers, tools, UK, United States, vendors, vision/possibilities, visualizing information, writing, youth, by Daniel Christian

101 creative ideas to use AI in education, A crowdsourced collection — from zenodo.org by Chrissi Nerantzi, Sandra Abegglen, Marianna Karatsiori, & Antonio Martínez-Arboleda (Eds.); with thanks to George Veletsianos for this resource

As an example, here’s one of the ideas from the crowdsourced collection:

On a somewhat related note, also see:

Merlyn Mind launches education-focused LLMs for classroom integration of generative AI — from venturebeat.com by Victor Dey

Excerpt:

Merlyn Mind, an AI-powered digital assistant platform, announced the launch of a suite of large language models (LLMs) specifically tailored for the education sector under an open-source license.

Designing courses in an age of AI — from teachinginhighered.com by Maria Andersen
Maria Andersen shares about designing courses in an age of artificial intelligence (AI) on episode 469 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.

With generative AI, we have an incredible acceleration of change happening.

Maria Andersen

Advancing Excellence in Education: The Changing Role of Centres for Teaching & Learning [Mihai]

On 06/28/2023, in accessibility / UDL, adjunct faculty, collaboration, colleges, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, digital learning, Europe, faculty, higher education, instructional design, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, learning theories, pedagogy, teaching & learning, universities, by Daniel Christian

Advancing Excellence in Education: The Changing Role of Centres for Teaching & Learning — from media-and-learning.eu by Alexandra Mihai, Maastricht University, The Netherlands

Excerpts:

Their most recognisable role is to partner with faculty and provide them with inspiration, expertise and support in their teaching. But a broader role is emerging at institutional level- helping create a culture where people value talking about teaching and more generally, fostering a culture of continuous learning. In this respect, CTLs act as agents of change, aiming to influence the organizational (learning) environment.
…
CTLs are part of an ecosystem, internally and externally, and they have the potential to play a very important role, that of a network node. Internally, this can mean connecting various silos within the university, a much needed task, while externally it implies establishing collaboration flows with other CTLs that can in turn lead to broader inter-university collaboration. Making use of the full potential of this role can make a big difference for the success of a CTL.

Speaking of Teaching & Learning Centers, also see:

7 Questions on Engaging Faculty in Digital Accessibility — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly
We asked the Technical College System of Georgia’s accessibility champions how they help instructors create a more inclusive learning experience for all students.

Our Learning Future from A to Z — from gettingsmart.com by Louka Parry

Key Points

Schools and organizations are human systems, filled with opportunities.
And yet there is a profound difference between building from a foundation of schooling and building from a foundation of learning.

Rather than simply replicate and scale the arrangements of schooling, we must seize the possibility to shift from a schooling system to a learning ecosystem to truly empower learners, educators, and parents to create a virtuous future for themselves and their communities.

Louka Parry

Our challenge will be how we choose to redesign and remake our experiences, environments, and ecosystems so that we unlock our true creative potential and thrive in the future.

What do higher education students want from online learning? — from mckinsey.com by Felipe Child, Marcus Frank, Jonathan Law, and Jimmy Sarakatsannis
What over 7000 students across 17 countries value most in online education

Beautiful creativity, design, architecture, and art.

On 06/20/2023, in art, creativity, design, Europe, UK, United States, vendors, by Daniel Christian

An Accessible Treetop Walkway Gracefully Winds Through Norway’s Hamaren Activity Park — from thisiscolossal.com

School of Visual Arts presents 10 senior thesis interior design projects — from dezeen.com

Resilience by Raymond Xie

An instrument for a city: An audio project filling one of London’s busiest roads with serene sounds — from inavateonthenet.net where Paul Milligan speaks to Nick Ryan, the artist responsible for VoiceLine.

An instrument for a city: An audio project filling one of London’s busiest roads with serene sounds

Why shouldn’t we have a piece of audio infrastructure as we do with lighting (lampposts) or seating, and use it to enable us to change the sound of a place, not once every 300 years but every second? We could transform the street using the sound of a rainforest into the sound of a river into the sound of voices.

From DSC:
A very interesting idea here. I can’t help but think there are applications of this type of thing within some of our learning spaces out there.

Mantra’s Immense Butterfly Murals Flutter Across Buildings and Walls — from thisiscolossal.com by Jackie Andres and Mantra

Web Design Inspiration (Examples) – Good Tools #7 — from goodtools.substack.com by Robin Good
70+ free inspirational collections showcasing over 55,000 best web design examples

A Veritable Aviary of Birds and Pollinators by The Paper Ark Are Small Enough to Perch on the Tip of a Finger — from thisiscolossal.com by Brace Ebert and Nayan Shrimali and Venus Bird

Accenture announces jaw-dropping $3 billion investment in AI [Franzen] + numerous other AI-related items

On 06/16/2023, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, Adobe, Apple, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning / Algorithms, business, corporate / business world, economics, education, education technology, Europe, future, game-changing environment, generational differences, Google, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, instructional design, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, IT in HE, K-12 related, leadership, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, Microsoft, open courseware and systems, pace of change, pedagogy, platforms, productivity / tips and tricks, skills, strategy, teachers, teaching & learning, technologies for your home, the downsides of how people use tech, tools, United States, universities, vendors, by Daniel Christian

Accenture announces jaw-dropping $3 billion investment in AI — from venturebeat.com by Carl Franzen; via Superhuman

Excerpt:

The generative AI announcements are coming fast and furious these days, but among the biggest in terms of sheer dollar commitments just landed: Accenture, the global professional services and consulting giant, today announced it will invest $3 billion (with a “b”!) in AI over the next three years in building out its team of AI professionals and AI-focused solutions for its clients.

“There is unprecedented interest in all areas of AI, and the substantial investment we are making in our Data & AI practice will help our clients move from interest to action to value, and in a responsible way with clear business cases,” said Julie Sweet, Accenture’s chairwoman and CEO.

Also related/see:

Artificial intelligence creates 40,000 new roles at Accenture — from computerweekly.com by Karl Flinders
Accenture is planning to add thousands of AI experts to its workforce as part of a $3bn investment in its data and artificial intelligence practice

Why leaders need to evolve alongside generative AI — from fastcompany.com by Kelsey Behringer
Even if you’re not an educator, you should not be sitting on the sidelines watching the generative AI conversation being had around you—hop in.

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

Leaders should be careful to watch and support education right now. At the end of the day, the students sitting in K-12 and college classrooms are going to be future CPAs, lawyers, writers, and teachers. If you are parenting a child, you have skin in the game. If you use professional services, you have skin in the game. When it comes to education, we all have skin in the game.
…
Students need to master fundamental skills like editing, questioning, researching, and verifying claims before they can use generative AI exceptionally well.

GenAI & Education: Enhancement, not Replacement — from drphilippahardman.substack.com by Dr. Philipa Hardman
How to co-exist in the age of automation

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

[On 6/15/23, I joined] colleagues from OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Stanford, Harvard and other others at the first meeting of the GenAI Summit. Our shared goal [was] to help to educate universities & schools in Europe about the impact of Generative AI on their work.

…how can we effectively communicate to education professionals that generative AI will enhance their work rather than replace them?

A recent controlled study found that ChatGPT can help professionals increase their efficiency in routine tasks by ~35%. If we keep in mind that the productivity gains brought by the steam engine in the nineteenth century was ~25%, this is huge.

As educators, we should embrace the power of ChatGPT to automate the repetitive tasks which we’ve been distracted by for decades. Lesson planning, content creation, assessment design, grading and feedback – generative AI can help us to do all of these things faster than ever before, freeing us up to focus on where we bring most value for our students.

Google, one of AI’s biggest backers, warns own staff about chatbots — from reuters.com by Jeffrey Dastin and Anna Tong

Excerpt:

SAN FRANCISCO, June 15 (Reuters) – Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O) is cautioning employees about how they use chatbots, including its own Bard, at the same time as it markets the program around the world, four people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The Google parent has advised employees not to enter its confidential materials into AI chatbots, the people said and the company confirmed, citing long-standing policy on safeguarding information.

The economic potential of generative AI: The next productivity frontier — from mckinsey.com
Generative AI’s impact on productivity could add trillions of dollars in value to the global economy—and the era is just beginning.

Preparing for the Classrooms and Workplaces of the Future: Generative AI in edX — from campustechnology.com by Mary Grush
A Q&A with Anant Agarwal

Adobe Firefly for the Enterprise — Dream Bigger with Adobe Firefly.
Dream it, type it, see it with Firefly, our creative generative AI engine. Now in Photoshop (beta), Illustrator, Adobe Express, and on the web.

Apple Vision Pro, Higher Education and the Next 10 Years — from insidehighered.com by Joshua Kim
How this technology will play out in our world over the next decade.

Zoom can now give you AI summaries of the meetings you’ve missed — from theverge.com by Emma Roth

Mercedes-Benz Is Adding ChatGPT to Cars for AI Voice Commands — from decrypt.co by Jason Nelson; via Superhuman
The luxury automaker is set to integrate OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot into its Mercedes-Benz User Experience (MBUX) feature in the U.S.

AI21 Labs concludes largest Turing Test experiment to date — from ai21.com
As part of an ongoing social and educational research project, AI21 Labs is thrilled to share the initial results of what has now become the largest Turing Test in history by scale.
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Learning Ecosystems

Are your students prepared for active learning? You can help them! [Mihai]

Top 10 Chief AI Officers [aimagazine.com]; The state of AI in 2023: Generative AI’s breakout year [McKinsey.com] + 19 other AI in general items

“Why we don’t intuitively get how fast the world is changing.” [Misha]

Universities are rethinking their streaming strategies. [Kridel]

Reflections on “Introducing Superalignment” + other items re: AI in general

“Who Does the Thinking: The Role of Generative AI in Higher Education” [Jensen, Dede, Tsiwah, & Thompson]+ other items re: AI in education/higher education

Advancing Excellence in Education: The Changing Role of Centres for Teaching & Learning [Mihai]

Beautiful creativity, design, architecture, and art.

AI21 Labs concludes largest Turing Test experiment to date [ai21.com]

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