Canadian expert praises Saudi Arabia's rapid AI, social progress

Arab News

18-05-2025

RIYADH: Janice Stein, founding director of the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Toronto, has praised the Kingdom's ongoing transformation and its growing role in artificial intelligence and education.
During a two-day visit, Stein met officials from government, academia, and the private sector, and highlighted Saudi Arabia's regional role while noting that much can be learned from Saudi Data and AI Authority's initiatives.
'We went to universities, think tanks, and government ministries that work in education and artificial intelligence,' said Stein, Belzberg professor of conflict management. She added: 'I think Canada can learn a lot.'
Stein noted that officials at the SDAIA had explained that the Kingdom will have a K-12 AI education strategy 'in which students from grade three onward will start to learn about artificial intelligence and engage with it.'
She told Arab News: 'Well, we are not there in Canada, and depending on how SDAIA measures and tracks its results, I think Canada can learn from the experiment SDAIA is running.'
Stein added that the future project led by SDAIA had not yet been implemented in Saudi Arabia, but much could be learned from its research and rollout.
'There is a sense that things are moving quickly and that will be foundational to the role Saudi Arabia will play in the future,' she said.
Stein also discussed the traditional educational cooperation model between Saudi Arabia and Canada, which has mainly involved Saudi students going abroad to study.
She said: 'I think that will remain, but that is the old model.'
Looking to the present, Stein said she was interested in sharing and learning from the 'very large experiment that Saudi society is now running.'
She stressed that the goal was in partnership and not encouraging Saudis to leave the Kingdom, adding: 'Saudi Arabia is playing a leading role in the Gulf; I think all Saudis know that.'
She said that Saudi Arabia had the weight and urgency to lead, and that what it needed was a clear focus and annual measurement to benchmark the country's progress against others.
'As a long-time student of the Middle East, my strong sense is that the Gulf is growing in strategic importance, things are moving, and the pace of change is accelerating,' she said.
'I thought, what a wonderful time to find an institutional partner here.'
Stein stressed how impressed she was by the 'sense of urgency' in Saudi Arabia's developmental efforts.
She said that in her conversations she had been struck by the strong focus on results and the awareness that time is limited, describing the urgency as 'really, really impressive.'
Stein also noted the clear changes that women are undergoing, saying that it was encouraging to see women working at the airport on her arrival.
She underlined that as women's roles start to change in society, that society itself begins to change.
Stein said that Saudi people understood the 'rapid pace of global change and the need to act quickly — something often missing in more established societies.'
She added: 'I think we all need that sense of urgency.'