Empowerly AI Scholar Reaches for New Heights

Technology will shape the future of many diverse career fields. If you’ve overheard worried people talking about AI or Artificial Intelligence, you might easily think it’s here to take over the world. Before we get carried away, let’s stick to the facts. Today, we bring you a case study from one of our Empowerly students, B, in her own words about how the AI Scholar Program helped her expand and explore her curiosity through a unique extracurricular activity.

How did this student get started? 

As an Empowerly student, partnered with a top counselor and a team of experts to develop a meaningful strategy to make the most of the high school years. 

In addition to selecting classes and providing academic support, our team encourages all students to develop their extracurricular narrative. For some students, this means expanding their range of experiences and skills. Empowerly offers a range of extracurricular programs, like the AI Scholar Program (AISP), to launch students into independent projects.

B shared: “My dad had actually sent me the [info about AISP], and I looked it over and I was pretty interested right off the bat. I did not know a lot about AI and I thought that it would be a good program to advance in the current [computer science] class that I'm taking at my school.

The main thing I wanted to focus on was how to apply AI to the real world and how it impacts our daily lives. One of the big things I know is that when I become an adult and I have a job, it's most likely that AI is going to be involved with whatever I'm doing. 

I [also] wanted a basic understanding of coding and how it works, but what I was most interested in was how AI is going to affect me later in life and how much of a general understanding of AI can I get now so I could be prepared.”

This program is geared toward beginning students, in addition to those with prior computer experience. “I was not advanced whatsoever. Before [AISP], on a scale of one to ten, I was maybe at a solid two. 

I will say that it was a little intimidating at first and I did feel a little bit behind, but my teachers were so open and always reaching out to see if we had any questions. They really wanted us to understand and because the class was so small and so intimate, I was never scared to speak up when I didn’t understand what was going on. "

"In my final session after completing the course, I really got to express what my favorite [parts of the program] were and we talked about how I can relate my experience to my college major and future careers. [My counselor and I] did a short writing exercise where I jotted down the main points of what I learned and then we went over a couple of examples of how to implement that in a good short essay that could be used for college applications or summer program applications.”

“It’s definitely easy to know which [class session] was my favorite. [Mid-way through the program] we had a class that focused on AI and what our world looks like right now. I specifically remember our teacher giving us a list of topics that AI is involved in and asking us to pick whichever one we wanted to explore for five minutes and come back with a summary for the class. [The topic] that caught my attention was AI and Siri. I read a really, really great article about how Siri has specific responses that are pretty questionable. These were actual responses, and I got so interested that I tried it on my phone too. [...] 

That was definitely my favorite class [because it] showed how AI is applied in the real world and what it looks like for us right now. At least two to three weeks later, I was still keeping up with [the topic] so I thought it was just a great outcome that actually still resonates with me today.”

“[My AI project] was focused on pneumonia detection. My dad's a doctor so [I already knew about] pneumonia itself as a relative concept, but not nearly to the extent that we researched. 

The final project itself was super fun. I think that was probably one of my favorite sessions that we had because we all worked together and everybody got to use their strengths to put together our presentation. It was a very good summary of everything we learned…and it was a super productive way to close out the whole experience itself.”

“AISP definitely got me ahead in my current computer science class, which was something that I was really hoping to get out of it. [The program] also definitely influenced how I research different careers and what my major might lead me to. This definitely shifted my focus and now I always make sure to look deeper into how aspects of AI will be tied into future job opportunities, how I could make a positive change using AI, or bring awareness to AI as well.

It gave me so much. It gave me a true understanding of what AI actually is because everybody always tells you in a couple of years a job's not going to be there or is going to look completely different because of AI. There may be robots all around me by the time I'm 40, but how does that really affect me, and I never took it seriously. I didn't think it was something that valuable to become knowledgeable about or focus on before, but after the AI Scholar Program, I clearly knew I was wrong. "

"You can't always predict what's going to happen in the future, but I do feel more prepared for what to look out for and the issues with AI currently. The bulk of what we learned was studying the many pros of AI and the many cons that not a lot of people talk about.

I think the biggest lesson that I probably got out of it was just being prepared for the future. I don't think I'm ever going to be some sort of programmer, but I do think that AISP is such a good program to get yourself a basic understanding of how your future might be affected by AI because It will affect everybody.”

To learn more about Empowerly’s AI Scholar Program and to sign up, visit our website at https://empowerly.com/ai-scholars-program. Curious about the other extracurricular programs we have to offer? Empowerly is here to help you reach for your potential and become your best self.