Speech - Address by Ms Low Khah Gek, CEO/ITE, at the Official Launch Of Intel AI for Citizens on 16 Mar 2021 (Tuesday), 9.00 AM, Espace, ITE College West

Mr Santhosh Viswanathan, Vice President & Managing Director – APJ (Asia Pacific Japan) Territory, Intel Corporation

Mr Brian Gonzalez, Senior Director, Global Partnerships and Initiatives (Governments, Markets and Trade, Intel Corporation)

Mr Anshul Sonak, Senior Director – Global AI Readiness (Program, Partnership and Policy, Intel Corporation)

Distinguished Partners and Guests from Industry

ITE Colleagues and Students

Ladies and Gentlemen

AI For Youth

1. On 21 Jan last year, ITE and Intel signed a Letter of Collaboration and launched the Intel® AI for Youth programme.  I recall being impressed by the thoughtful curricular design of:

2. Inspire – use cases to illustrate possibilities and potential of AI to get students excited

3. Acquire – hands-on learning of basic AI concepts

4. Experience – practical workshops to delve deeper

5. Empower – students use newly acquired skills to create AI projects

6. I am pleased to highlight the progress we have made since last January. 3,165 ITE students completed the ‘Inspire’ and ‘Acquire’ modules and 31 students completed the Experience module which is a 176-hour AI Bootcamp and 15 students did the Empower module stage by embarking on AI social impact projects and achieved the Intel Certificate of Accomplishment. These 15 students are also recognised by Intel as AI For Youth Student Mentor and can wear the special AI For Youth Student Mentor jacket. We are proud of them (and they are proud of their prestigious jacket). 

7. All ITE Year1 students (~14,000) are taught basic AI through the AI For Everyone programme and have taken the Baseline AI Competency assessment.  I am pleased that their performance is on par with their peers in other institutions. 

8. Our partnership with Intel enables us to offer AI For Youth to our students to deepen their AI competencies and challenge them to pursue AI projects. There will be a showcase of eight projects by the students and the work they do cover a wide range of application areas, such as a robot concierge to welcome guests/customers and introduce products/services, detecting of phishing emails, turning smartphones into robots and humanoid robot for search and rescue.  

9. It is also through Intel and AI For Youth that ITE students have exchange programmes with Korean students on AI learning and AI applications. ITE students visited Korea in September 2019 and they came to ITE in January 2020. Because of Covid-19 pandemic, while our students could not visit Korea in Sept 2020, the exchange programme proceeded in the virtual mode. We hope the opportunity to have physical face-to-face leaning and sharing together will happen soon. 

10. My staff and I are very heartened by the strong interest and high potential demonstrated by our ITE students and we have decided to develop a Higher Nitec in AI Applications course and a Work-Study Electronics and AI programme. These would be launched later this year and next year.

AI For Citizens

11. This year, our partnership with Intel has expanded. We will collaborate with Intel to offer AI For Citizens. This programme focuses on introducing AI and related concepts to help citizens understand how AI has become an integral part of all our lives and how we are already using AI without realising it. It shows us all the everyday use of AI, the industry use of AI and the new potential and possibilities it can bring to our future. More importantly, it emphasises the ethical use of AI and explains key principles to ensure responsible and proper use of AI. 

12. ITE is happy to bring AI For Citizens to all members of the public at no cost to participants. It is ITE’s efforts to be part of the national efforts to demystify AI and its applications. This four-hour self-learning course would be conducted via ITE’s Gnowbe MLC platform and participants can acquire two badges from Intel: AI Aware and AI Appreciate.  I have completed my learning and here are my badges! I found AI For Citizens refreshing, engaging and I did gain new understanding. I urge everyone to give it a go. 

Conclusion

13. In closing, I wish to thank Intel for the strong partnership and collaboration with ITE. I am confident that together we will excite, equip and empower students and citizens to harness the potential of AI, as well as fire the passion and ambition of the students to pursue careers to create numerous AI-enabled applications and enrich all our lives.

14. Thank you and have a pleasant day.