Successful AI Day at Goethe High School in Emmendingen

AI and related fields were the focus of a somewhat different kind of professional development day at the Goethe-Gymnasium in Emmendingen. It was “somewhat different” because it wasn’t just the teachers who participated in the training—students from 8th grade through the upper school were also involved. Volunteer guest lecturers who had traveled there specifically for the event gave special presentations.

From Hochschule Offenburg, the following participated: Prof. Dr. Günther Waibel, Prof. Dr. Bernd Waltersberger, Prof. Dr. Jörg Lienhard (both from the Department of Maschinenbau and Process Engineering), and Prof. Dr. Daniela Oelke (department of Electrical Engineering, Medical Engineering and Computer Science), along with several research assistants, who contributed practical projects and a presentation to the program. They also brought along their robot dog and a humanoid robot. Together, they explained to the high school students in Emmendingen what is already technically possible today with artificial intelligence (AI)—and how, for example, they can get the robot dog to walk sideways or on two “paws.” The students were thrilled; they watched the robot dog’s somewhat clumsy movements intently, waited eagerly for it to do a handstand on its own again, and agreed at the end: “We got a great insight into AI today—this is what makes AI fun!”

Principal Dr. Ulrich Schmidt had organized the extensive program together with the parents’ council to help the students understand both the opportunities and the risks of AI. With ChatGPT and similar technologies in mind, he hoped that the students had come to realize: True intelligence isn’t inside the computer—it’s right in front of it!