What is What The Tech?

Introduction

How do people, especially youth, want Artificial Intelligence (AI) to support and advance their communities? We set out to answer this question in early 2024. We are pretty confident we DIDN’T fully answer it, but we learned a lot about what it will take to get there.

We want to use this website share that learning with you so that we can all be a part of realizing a community- and youth-led vision for public interest AI in cities across the country and the world.

The website is organized for three different purposes:

Learning what AI is and could be.

The website includes introductory videos and activities on how AI works and how to begin using it (e.g., prompt engineering with ChatGPT). It includes pathways to engaging with student-generated use cases for AI and the lessons we learned about public concerns regarding AI.

Educating others about AI

We have made our educational materials available through the website, organized by program and module (or workshop). This includes slides, worksheets for activities, summaries for implementation, and, where appropriate, participant final projects.

Impacting technology policy.

Focusing on lessons learned, we highlight some specific concerns that surfaced throughout the WTT? program, as well as how AI policies should put youth and community voices at their center. This includes the need for education that both the opportunities and risks for specific AI use cases.