TUMO Center for Creative Technologies Awarded Top Prize in 2023-24 Tools Competition

The TUMO Center for Creative Technologies has received the highest honor in the prestigious 2023-24 Tools Competition, recognized for its exceptional contributions to the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in the education sector. This accolade comes as a significant achievement, especially given the competition's robust participation, with over 1,900 submissions from around the world. The competition is supported by renowned organizations, including OpenAI, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Schmidt Futures, and the Ballmer Group.

TUMO's Chief Development Officer, Pegor Papazian, emphasized the institution's commitment to adopting and developing AI solutions across multiple facets of its educational offerings. The center is focused on enhancing its learning platform, introducing a generative AI curriculum as a new skill area, and integrating AI into various technology and design disciplines, such as coding, game development, filmmaking, and graphic design.

The Tools Competition award will fund the development of TUMO’s AI Learning Coach. This innovative project aims to personalize education by creating unique learning paths for each student, leveraging millions of hours of student data. The project team will experiment with different AI technologies and collaborate with researchers from the Stanford AI Lab, Berkeley School of Education, and Carnegie Mellon University, providing anonymized training data to support complementary projects in AI and learning science.

TUMO's broader engagement with generative AI was highlighted last September with the launch of the tumo.ai website and a global symposium on AI and education. The symposium attracted contributions from major technology companies such as Google DeepMind, NVIDIA, and Meta, as well as academic institutions like MIT, Harvard, and USC. Prominent thought leaders, including Mitchel Resnick, Stephen Wolfram, and Daron Acemoglu, also participated, providing valuable insights into the intersection of AI and education.

This September, TUMO is set to present its innovative approach to AI education at UNESCO’s Digital Learning Week in Paris. The center aims to emphasize the importance of ethics and safety in integrating powerful new technologies into educational curricula. Papazian noted that while these considerations are crucial, a solely defensive approach to AI is insufficient, particularly in underserved communities and developing countries. TUMO's goal is to equip young people with the deep technical insights necessary to actively participate in ecosystems of technology innovation.

Through its ongoing efforts, TUMO Center for Creative Technologies continues to position itself at the forefront of educational innovation, leveraging AI to transform the learning experience for students globally.