The Annual Lilian Baylis Technology School 6th Form Dinner, hosted by the WCIT on 23 Oct 2024
The WCIT has had a relationship with The Lilian Baylis Technology School since 2002, providing support, governors, career guidance and student mentoring.
For a number of years, we have hosted an annual dinner for a group of Year 12 students along with two teachers/staff. Six WCIT members also attend with one acting as the host. The dinner is a three-course formal meal with waiter service aimed at giving the students an opportunity to experience a formal meal and business environment. Three presentations are given by the students on a pre-arranged topic over the course of the meal – one between each course. At the end of the presentations, a discussion is held to reflect on the hot topic of the day and the findings.
This year our Host was Paul Finch, the WCIT’s Junior Warden ably supported by the Clerk, Susan Hoefling. The WCIT team included Richard Pone (Past Governor), Dee O’Neal (new Freeman), Ji Li (Education & Training Committee) and Steve Smith (an ex LBTS pupil).
The chosen topic of the day:
“Artificial Intelligence is a collection of information technologies that try to mimic human learning and problem-solving skills (source Wikipedia). Stephen Hawking says that “Artificial Intelligence will be ‘either best or worst thing’ for humanity.’” Just by looking around you, you’ll see that computers and smartphones are getting smarter all the time, and progress is getting faster all the time. So, thinking of a typical day 5 to 10 years into your future, tell us how Artificial Intelligence will affect your work life?”
We heard from 3 groups of students who shared their vision of the future and the impact of AI. Junior Warden Paul Finch, recorded a few notes on their views:
Business: Increased Productivity, but with huge job displacement creating a possible global economic drought but may not be totally negative if AI could used to work alongside the workforce, rather than replacing it.
Education: Improved administration, students will be able to learn at their own pace and get real time feedback. However, there were possible concerns over the privacy of personal data and the potential for reduced critical thinking as the work is being done for them.
Entertainment: AI will see huge growth in this sector with generated Art, Music & Film with the ability to generate / create characters. The downside is the potential risk to the erosion of human creativity which may be taken over by Deep Fake and misused with inappropriate content. In addition, the subject of IPR ownership on content is going to be immensely challenging.
Ethical: Substantial problems around the protection of personal data, as well as the environmental impact caused by huge data centres consuming vast amounts of power and water. The latter will also conflict with the Climate Agenda. The social impact caused by reduced emotional intelligence is another issue to be confronted.
Skills that will be required: AI has been around since the 1950’s when it was started by Alan Turing. Since then, we have seen careers for Data Scientists and Machine Learning engineers growing. A lot of the jobs will require mathematics as a base point with good problem-solving abilities. Other areas include Database, Communications (to personalise) & AI Ethics Specialists.
Real Life Application: The students envisage a time when AI might be conducting Clinical Surgery procedures with more accuracy than humans. Other areas include Healthcare (AI Imaging, Personalised Treatment Pathways, patient monitoring), Education, Personal Virtual Assistants, optimisation of transport. A lot of manual labour jobs will be replaced by robotics and AI.
A very thought-provoking set of views expressed by the students who, whilst expressing their concerns, seemed at the same time satisfied at the thought of their roles going forward. This may be because they can also clearly see careers for themselves within the industry that is driving these changes.