New Workshop: Artificial Intelligence!

“Women in AI” (WAI) is a non-profit association that works worldwide for gender justice in the research and working world of artificial intelligence (AI). Through active cooperation, joint research, interesting events and public relations work, more and more women all over the world should be encouraged and supported to become involved in the field of AI. Experienced experts from the region conduct interactive and age-appropriate workshops and presentations that provide a realistic insight into the field. If you want to learn more, please visit the website https://www.womeninai.co/.

“WAI-Class” is a special format that gives girls an introduction to the topics of artificial intelligence, programming and machine learning. Daniela Dufft, our science teacher, is personally connected with Tina Nord, the WAI ambassador in Berlin, and together they have created an exciting workshop on artificial intelligence exclusively for our Platanus students. In cooperation with the Axel Springer Publishing Group, 20 girls and boys from our elective courses “Robotics” and “Coding” were invited to the modern publishing house on Markgrafenstraße in Berlin-Mitte and listened to interesting lectures and presentations on the topic of AI. Axel Springer itself has its own department with research on the topic of AI, which is mainly concerned with automated and modern text and image recognition.

Our students in the 5th and 6th grades were first given a general introduction to the field of activity and state of research by Dat Tran, Head of AI at Axel Springer. Then Tina Nord and Nathalie Turner, founder of BEI GIRLS (Believe.Empower.Inspire), talked about “Self-confidence in female programmers”. They reported on how they came to the research field of AI and on initial skepticism or prejudices they experienced as women in their professions. In the meantime, they are recognized and successful professionals in their field.

After lunch, another workshop took place. Alisa Kim, Data Scientist & Researcher at the Humboldt University Berlin, and Małgorzata Adamczyk, Machine Learning Engineer at Axel Springer, practiced analog programming together with the children and impressively illustrated the importance of correct and error-free step-by-step instructions in programming.

This workshop “WAI-Class” was actually founded for girls to encourage them to pursue a career in the field of artificial intelligence. It was important to us to organize the project day for girls and boys to make the children aware that there are no classic women’s or men’s jobs.

As a science-oriented school, we look forward to continuing to work with “Women in AI”. Our goal is to always hold new and exciting project days, with a STEM reference and above all free of gender stereotypes. Many thanks to Daniela Dufft and Tina Nord for the organization, to all the speakers for their time and effort and to the Axel Springer Publishing Group for hosting the workshop on their premises.