Earlier this month, faculty members from the UGA College of Engineering hosted 21 local middle school educators for a three-day workshop on applying topics in AI and computer vision to their curriculum. Participating educators represented the following county school districts: Barrow, Clarke, Greene, and Gwinnett. A representative from a school district in Florida attended as well.
Professors Ramana Pidaparti and John Mativo are part of the National Science Foundation (NSF) funded ITEST program, ImageSTEAM project designed to introduce AI and computer vision concepts to middle school students. A collaboration between the University of Georgia and Arizona State University, ImageSTEAM’s goal is to encourage students to pursue interests in STEM and empower teachers to train the next generation in upcoming AI technologies.
The workshop provided participants with knowledge and resources to both incorporate AI into their curriculum and use existing technologies to build and develop lesson modules. The participating teachers walked away inspired and excited about the potential of these cutting-edge tools. From the workshop experience, the educators expressed a strong desire to attend more workshops related to this topic in the future to continue building their skills. Both Pidaparti and Mativo commended the dedication of the educators and expressed a mutual desire to collaborate on future AI-focused activities within elementary and middle school education.
