Skilling Up Ireland for an AI future

Like the dawn of the internet, mobile devices and the cloud, AI has the potential to transform and augment how people live and work. Rapid advances in large language models and generative AI are unlocking even more possibilities across search, productivity and creativity, and in uses like healthcare and security.

However, a lack of skills is now recognised as the most significant obstacle to the adoption of AI, indicating just how critical the development of the right skills and capabilities is to take advantage of the technology.

Microsoft is on a mission to Skill Up Ireland by providing people of all ages, experiences and ambitions with the opportunity to upskill in AI.

It has developed an ambitious national AI skills programme with a range of AI learning opportunities for young people in primary and post-primary education, as well as courses for graduates and mid-career professionals looking to upskill and specialise in AI.

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The programme is fully aligned with the Government’s National AI Strategy, entitled AI – Here for Good, which aims to expand access to courses that educate the public about AI as well as providing AI upskilling and reskilling opportunities for those in the workforce.

Welcoming the programme, Minister for Trade Promotion, Digital and Company Regulation Dara Calleary said: “The use and deployment of AI can bring with it huge benefits and efficiencies for society and the economy, but if we are to seize those opportunities, we must be prepared for them and a key part of that is education and upskilling. By encouraging a lifelong learning approach to AI skilling, we can realise the ambition of our National AI Strategy and work towards achieving our goal of 75 per cent of businesses using AI by 2030.”

The new programme is a continuation of a long-term commitment to education by Microsoft. “Education and skilling are core to what we do here at Microsoft,” says Microsoft Ireland head of learning and skills Dr Kevin Marshall. “We’ve worked with educators, teachers, students for as long as I’ve been here, which is over 20 years or so in various different guises.”

That work must move with the times. “As we’re all aware, the world is shifting faster all the time in terms of how technology is being deployed, how it’s been used, and how it’s changing fundamentally,” he continues. “In the last 18 months, since the launch of generative AI and large language models, we have thought about how we can engage everybody in helping them understand what AI is at a foundational level and give them the skills and the tools to make their own choices on how to use it to progress their careers and help them in their personal lives.”

The Skill Up Ireland programme covers three main areas, according to Marshall – primary and secondary school students, people in the workforce, and the wider public.

“The first is primary and secondary schools through our Dream Space initiative, which has been up and running for about six years,” he says. “The second looks at giving people a pathway towards learning new skills and the opportunity to earn some professional certifications. We are offering a very useful, industry recognised Career Essentials Certificate in generative AI, for example. The third area is a more general approach to engaging the wider public. Our focus there is to provide foundational AI courses for people.”

Launched in 2018, the Microsoft Dream Space initiative has supported primary and secondary school students across the island to develop their STEM and AI skills. “It’s a STEM-based facility we have here on site at our campus in Leopardstown where we bring in two schools a day and take them through a series of STEM based activities in the areas of complex problem solving and computational thinking,” says Marshall.

“We try to introduce students to the wider conversation around STEM based activities,” he adds. “Obviously during the pandemic, we had to change the strategy because people couldn’t come into the building, so we developed a series of online resources, as well as a series of lessons for primary and secondary school students on coding on Minecraft, for example. Students and teachers can access them through our website, and we also run a series of live events where students can register and login to the Dream Space facility.”

The offering has now been expanded to include AI. “We talk about how AI is enabling our cities and our communities, and then we go on to teach the students about the technology through a series of activities.”

Keen to extend its reach still further Microsoft teamed up with RTÉ Learn to launch the online Brainwaves series aimed at educating young people about AI. Two of the series’ six episodes have been designed for upper primary school students while the other four target post primary students.

“The series helps schools and students to think about generative AI, teaches them what it is, what it’s not, and how to engage with it,” says Marshall. “We set up a competition with RTE which asked students to come up with some clever ideas as to how the technology could be used in the modern world, either in their school or in their community. The final comprised five post-primary schools and it was amazing to see the students tackle real-world concerns in their communities and explore how AI could address these issues through the development of their own AI for Good solutions within a structured learning environment.”

Adult learning is also of vital importance.

The skilling programme also offers access to eight professional certificates to help people learn the foundational skills and relevant hard and soft skills needed for in-demand tech and tech-enabled jobs.

Within the offering, there is a dedicated AI learning pathway where learners can improve their AI fluency and achieve an industry recognised careers essential certificate in Generative AI. This programme is being extended to people in rural communities across Ireland by way of in-person upskilling events, in collaboration with Fastrack into Information Technology (FIT).

Extending the programme’s reach further, Microsoft presented a series of live lectures in late 2023 at its headquarters in south county Dublin to help people to advance their digital and AI skills so they can participate fully in an AI-enabled economy. “The lectures covered a different topic each week,” Marshall explains. “Over the next number of months, we will be making some of that content available on demand and that will hopefully help us to reach a wider audience. We will also look to partner with other organisations so that we can support even more people to learn about the technology and the tools they can use to engage productively in generative AI.”

“We provide examples around AI related to manufacturing, tourism and health, as well as more general cases. In addition to the different product sets out there and where they’re being used, we also introduce the learner to AI ethics and the concept of responsible AI as well as the EU Act which will become more relevant and pertinent over the coming months and years,” he explains.

The different courses and resources that Microsoft has made available are all free to access. “It’s part of our commitment to education, to societal good, and to advancing the economy,” he explains. “It’s core to our DNA.”

By rolling out the numerous AI learning pathways, Microsoft Ireland is empowering people of all ages, backgrounds and experiences to gain the analytical, creative thinking and technical skills that are necessary to participate fully in an AI-enabled economy.

To learn more about Microsoft’s ambition to Skill Up Ireland and the many skills training initiatives we’re providing, visit: aka.ms/SkillUpIreland.