Computer Science Education Week is an annual event celebrated worldwide. It is a call to action to inspire K-12 students to learn computer science, advocate for equity, and celebrate the contributions of students, teachers, and partners to the field.
The 2023 theme was ‘Impacts of Computing’ – computer science’s positive and negative effects on various aspects of our lives… education, privacy, security, and accessibility.
TKS students – in Kindergarten, Elementary, Middle and High school – celebrated the computer science experiences that are being developed by TKS educators and students through demonstrations and displays of related projects and their impact in society; had the opportunity to take part in a range of talks, activities and workshops to spark curiosity and interest and to support learning in computer science, AI and robotics; and connected with parents and academics in the field at the KAUST university, for a shared experience on the status of computer science education.
The KG students were excited to welcome Spot the Robotic Dog, and also interacted other robots, supported by university students and researchers from the RISC Lab and Climate & Livability Initiative.
The Elementary students took part in a number of coding activities, and also learned more about how Spot the Robotic Dog works, and the research work that he is involved in.
The Middle and High Schoolers students learnt more about the use of drones and satellites in vital research, increased their knowledge of AI and coding, debated the ethical dilemmas of AI and language models (such as ChatGPT), and took part in a live hacking demonstration.
Photos from the various activities that took place can be found here.
Thanks to:
- Eric Feron and colleagues/students at the RISC Lab, KAUST University
- Matthew McCabe, Omar Camargo, Dario Scilla and Mariana Lara from the Climate & Livability Initiative, KAUST University
- Mohammed Ujaimi, Rakhaa Bin Ahmed, Nejoud Alassiri, Roba Alghanmi and Tahir Ismail from the InfoSec team, KAUST University
- David Pugh, Director of the SDAIA-KAUST Center for Data Science & AI
- Mohamed ElHoseiny and Kilichbek Haydarov from the CEMSE Division, KAUST University.