AI Academy: Advancing AI Literacy
The AI Academy is a key pillar of IRCAI’s mission to empower people worldwide to understand, engage with, and benefit from artificial intelligence. It serves as an open, inclusive, and accessible hub for AI knowledge transfer, bringing together educational materials, training programs, and collaborative learning initiatives under one roof. The key objectives are to provide tailored learning pathways and resources for diverse audiences, promote responsible, ethical, and trustworthy use of AI, and foster international collaboration and inclusivity in AI education.
E-learning Collection on Trustworthy and Democratic AI
Developed in the Horizon Europe project AI4Gov, the “Trustworthy and Democratic AI” curriculum provides a structured learning framework linked to general and digital competences. It is delivered as a collection of five MOOCs on OpenLearn Create, offering more than 100 hours of open and free learning materials, including digital badges and certificates upon completion.
Key features:
- Focus on bias in AI, AI ethics, governance, and technical standards.
- Beginner and intermediate levels, available in multiple languages (English, Spanish, Slovene).
- Open access, with digital credentials and platform-level evaluation and feedback.
Link to collection Trustworthy and Democratic AI
Training for Public Administration
In collaboration with the Slovenian Ministry for Public Administration, the AI Academy designs and delivers targeted trainings for the public sector (2025–2026). Each thematic training is a 3-hour session in Slovene, repeated several times to reach a broad audience of public administration and wider public-sector employees. Training themes:
- AI in the public sector – ethical challenges and responsible use.
- Legal aspects of the use of AI in the public sector.
- Authorship, intellectual property, and responsibility in the use of AI.
These trainings support practical capacity building for implementing AI in public services in a responsible and legally robust way.
AI and Media Literacy Activities
Within the EC CERV project PERISCOPE (2026–2027), the AI Academy contributes to training and learning events focused on AI tools, AI literacy, and media literacy. Activities target children and youth, teachers, journalists, and citizens, and will result in an “AI tools training kit” (in English and Slovene) and new train-the-trainer resources. Some PERISCOPE events are available as video lectures:
- Sessions for teachers on “Students’ Digital Literacy: Using AI to Understand the Information Space”.
- Workshops for students: “Become an information detective with AI”.
- Training for journalists and media experts: “AI Tools to Support Media Literacy”.
open access educational video lectures repository
VideoLectures.NET is an award-winning, free and open-access repository of educational video lectures from conferences, summer schools, workshops and other scientific events. As part of the AI Academy, it hosts recordings of inclusive AI panels, thematic trainings from AI4Gov, and other AI-related content for reuse in learning and teaching.
Link to platform Videolectures.NET
Online mentoring programme FOR OER
The Open Education for a Better World (OE4BW) international mentoring programme, launched in 2017 and coordinated by the UNESCO Chair on Open Technologies. It has produced more than 600 OER and engaged over 1,000 developers, mentors, and hub coordinators worldwide, with a strong focus on SDG 4 – Quality Education. The programme supports the co-creation of socially relevant OER and explores the integration of AI in education, for example in personalised learning and innovative digital pedagogy.
Link to website OE4BW.org
Industry-Oriented Learning
To support businesses in understanding and applying AI, the AI Academy also reaches industry through (1) expert consulting and advisory activities on responsible and trustworthy AI adoption, (2) the MBA Artificial Intelligence in Business study programme at the School of Economics and Business, University of Ljubljana, co-developed with IRCAI. This combination of open courses, targeted trainings, mentoring, and applied programmes creates a practical entry point for companies at different levels of AI readiness.
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on Artificial Intelligence (IRCAI)
under the auspices of UNESCO
Jožef Stefan Institute
Jamova cesta 39
SI-1000 Ljubljana
info@ircai.org
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