On 8 October 2020 the Hon. Clayton Bartolo, Parliamentary Secretary for Financial Services and Digital Economy, launched a freely available Elements of AI online course that has the sole purpose of introducing and teaching AI basics to all web users irrespective of their background.
The Department of Artifiical Intelligence (AI) headed by Prof. Matthew Montebello is collaborating on this course on behalf of the University of Malta with the eSkills Malta Foundation at a local level together with the University of Helsinki and a Finish-based company called Reaktor at a European level within an EU programme scheme.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is like electricity. It will affect our lives in so many ways, and therefore should not be left in the hands of a few elite coders.
In spring of 2018, technology company Reaktor and the University of Helsinki came together to democratise artificial intelligence. This project is an example of best-practice where industry and education collaborate for the benefit of society. Together, these two organisations, as a gift marking the end of Finland's Presidency of the Council of the European Union, designed, developed and deployed this free online course and are now providing it in a variety of foreign languages including Maltese.
The course explains the implications of AI in everyday situations with interactive exercises so that the students can make informed decisions as workers, voters, media and product consumers.
The Elements of AI course is a benchmark for making complex issues easily understandable and fun to learn. This course is an introduction to AI with no complicated math or programming required. Age, profession or country make no difference for this course. The six chapters of the course are estimated to take 25 hours. After taking the course, individuals can understand some of the major implications of AI, think critically about AI news and claims, define and discuss what AI is, and explain the methods that make AI possible.
The course can be found online.