AI skills drive in schools to ‘put power in hands of next generation'
Secondary school pupils will be taught skills in artificial intelligence (AI) as part of a drive to put the technological power 'into the hands of the next generation', Sir Keir Starmer will announce.
Some on million students will be given access to learning resources to start equipping them for 'the tech careers of the future' as part of the Government's £187 million 'TechFirst' scheme, Downing Street said.
Meanwhile, staff at firms across the country will be trained to 'use and interact' with chatbots and large language models as part of a plan backed by Google and Microsoft to train 7.5 million workers in AI skills by 2030.
The TechFirst programme will be split into four strands, with TechYouth – the £24 million 'flagship' arm – aimed at giving students across every secondary school in the UK the chance to gain new AI skills training over three years.
The other strands are:
– TechGrad, backed by £96.8 million in funding and designed to support 1,000 domestic students a year with undergraduate scholarships in areas such as AI and computer science.
– A £48.4 million TechExpert scheme aiming to give up to £10,000 in additional funding to 500 domestic PhD students carrying out research in tech.
– TechLocal, backed by £18 million, will offer seed funding to small businesses developing new tech products and adopting AI.
The Prime Minister is also launching a new Government partnership with industry to train 7.5 million UK workers in essential skills to use AI by 2030.
Tech giants including Google, Microsoft, IBM, Nvidia, BT and Amazon have signed up to make 'high-quality' training materials widely available to workers free of charge over the next five years, Number 10 said.
It comes as research commissioned by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) showed that by 2035, AI will play a part in the roles and responsibilities of around 10 million workers.
The Prime Minister said: 'We are putting the power of AI into the hands of the next generation – so they can shape the future, not be shaped by it.
'This training programme will unlock opportunity in every classroom – and lays the foundations for a new era of growth.
'Too many children from working families like the one I grew up in are written off. I am determined to end that.'
Sir Keir hosted a private reception at Chequers on Sunday with leading technology bosses and investors, including former Google chief executive Eric Schmidt, Faculty AI co-founder Angie Ma, Google DeepMind chief Demis Hassabis and Scale boss Alex Wang.
On Tuesday, he will invite industry figures to Downing Street, including 16-year-old AI entrepreneur Toby Brown, who recently secured 1 million dollars in Silicon Valley funding for his startup, Beem.
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