San Jose,CA, USA
Partnership Case Study: Students from Bellarmine College Preparatory Collaborate on AI for Social Good Projects with Stanford Alumni
Inspirit AI's team recently partnered with Bellarmine College Preparatory in San Jose to offer students an interdisciplinary AI capstone experience during Fall 2023 to begin their journey in artificial intelligence. Bellarmine College Preparatory is a prestigious all-boys Catholic school located in San Jose, California. It offers a rigorous academic curriculum and a strong emphasis on character development and community service.
BRINGING STANFORD AND MIT AI RESEARCHERS TO LEAD A PRE-COLLEGE EXPERIENCE
Inspirit AI's programs at leading K12 schools around the world are taught by graduate students and alumni at Stanford, MIT and Ivy League colleges who share their practical knowledge of AI and its applications to diverse fields in accessible and project-based ways. In this program the team traveled to San Jose.
One of the lead instructors in this program was Shreyas Muralidharan. Shreyas Muralidharan is a PhD student at Stanford studying Electrical Engineering. His research focuses on Brain Machine Interfaces. He is specifically studying the brain as it performs cognitive functions such as visual attention, and how we can use this to create cognitive prosthetics. Outside of school, he loves biking, singing Indian Classical Music, and generally spending time outdoors. Instructors brought to bear AI curriculum delivered through a project-based approach focused on making the content relevant to a diverse group of students, many of whom had no CS experience.
FIRST HALF: AI FOUNDATIONS FOR ARTISTS, BIOLOGISTS AND MORE!
AI principles can be applied to solve a boundless set of problems from designing a game of Pac-Man to creating an autonomous assistant for astronauts, and everything in between. Machine learning has also earned a place in creative domains, where art installations often feature artificial intelligence, and mobile applications can turn any photo into a Van-Gogh-esque painting. In the first half of the course, students learn AI's core technologies including applications, foundational concepts, and programming tools covering topics such as Linear and Logistic regression, natural language processing and computer vision that underlie these applications.
SECOND HALF: ETHICAL AI CAPSTONE PROJECTS
In the second-half of the course, students complete an instructor-led group project, applying the programming skills developed in the first half. For instance, some of the students at Bellarmine College Preparatory built a project on Music Recommender Systems. reviewed logistic regression of Spotify data to predict which songs will become top hits based on different song metrics. Then, they worked on a system to recommend new songs to listeners (using popular songs and similar songs) and even predicting top hits, but this time by using the raw music audio! Students found the projects hands-on, ethically oriented and enjoyed working closely with graduate students at the leading universities in the US.
"I liked the project because we were able to learn how it applies to the real world and learn more about something interesting."
— Student from Bellarmine College Preparatory
Some of the other notable projects that students explore in the Inspirit AI program include:
Safe ChatGPT: The aim of this project was for students to critically engage with LLMs (especially GPT-3 and GPT-3.5). They worked on using ChatGPT to build a truthful chatbot and minimize hallucinations often likely in LLMs. Questions regarding AI safety, privacy, and model bias animated thoughtful conversations that informed the design and execution of students' final project.
AI and Biology: Another notable project students work on is to build an AI system that uncovers the underlying system of interaction between proteins. Through combining computational biology and machine learning, they develop an AI model that predicts protein interactions and highlights disease pathways vital for clinical understanding and therapeutic intervention.
AI and Space Safety: Scientifically-minded students work on projects that help design safe space suits by locating astronauts' body positions in 3D using cutting-edge computer vision techniques like semantic segmentation. This was an exciting application to space research and work that channeled the spirit of exploration among students!
Impact Within and Beyond the Classroom
The following are some of the comments from education leaders who helped organize these programs last year.
"Bellarmine’s partnership with Inspirit AI has filled an important void in our offerings for both middle and high school level students in our Summer Programs. Courses have become so popular that we expanded that partnership to continue through the regular year in our evening course offerings. As both the Director of our Summer Programs and a member of our Computer Science department, I understand the importance of providing students with the opportunity to learn about the world they live in and understand the software and tools that we use on daily basis. As we learn to master our partnership with machine learning and artificial intelligence, new doors are opening every day in medicine, manufacturing, and many other fields. Inspirit’s project-based approach ensures that students see real world context and relevance in their work, which marks a contrast from other traditional educational practices in computer science and related fields. Instructors have been exemplary in working with students to help them understand concepts and create solutions that they then present as a final project at the conclusion of the camp. This practicum sparks students’ imagination and drive towards self-driven projects beyond the scope of class-time, ensuring that they carry these skills forward to other future opportunities."
— Chris Cozort, Director of Summer Programs, Computer Science & Animation Teacher, Bellarmine College Preparatory
“Studying artificial intelligence is unlike anything else we have ever offered in the Middle School. By partnering with Inspirit AI and working directly with graduate students from Stanford and MIT, we are certain that our students will constantly be exposed to new and cutting-edge ideas. A course like this will surely equip our students to thrive in an ever-evolving world.”
— Ken Weinstein, Head of Middle School, The Hun School of Princeton
"This was so great and the fact that they presented with such confidence on the last day made my heart sing. I really haven't seen some of those kids as confident presenting before. Prepping for the final presentation was an invaluable learning part of the two weeks"
— Rachel Hovington, Head of School, Benjamin Franklin International School
PREPARING YOUNG MINDS FOR AN AI-POWERED FUTURE
As artificial intelligence continues to transform all disciplines, the opportunities for students to address society's most pressing issues with AI through a project-based, collaborative approach are significant. Many innovative schools integrate Inspirit's curriculum in their elective, before/after school, and intersession periods to offer K12 students the chance to learn 21st century skills including coding, data visualization, explainability, and scientific communication. Feel free to reach out to Jared Greene, Inspirit's Director of Programs, at jared@inspiritai.com to learn about how your school can get involved. Learn more at inspiritai.com/schools.
ABOUT INSPIRIT AI
The Inspirit AI Scholars program, led by graduate students from Stanford and MIT, provides students with an introduction to machine learning, Python, and AI in a project-based environment. Students can complete interdisciplinary group projects and independent 1:1 research projects with mentors from Stanford, MIT, and other leading universities and require no computer science experience to apply. www.inspiritai.com
