May 29, 2024 — Ahead of the AI for Good Summit, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) is announcing a new humanitarian partnership with OpenAI leveraging cutting-edge AI technology to improve learning outcomes and reduce disruptions in learning for children in crisis-affected communities.
A total of 224 million school-aged and pre-school aged children are affected by crises globally, and 199 million of those children are either out of school or in school but not learning. Growing inequality, poverty, and instability remain among the main barriers to education worldwide. Even when children can attend school, the growing teacher shortage makes learning nearly impossible.
To help address this critical need, the IRC is developing aprendIA, an AI-driven educational chatbot platform that delivers personalized learning experiences that crisis-affected communities can access—in particular, teachers and parents. aprendIA will deploy educational interventions quickly in diverse humanitarian contexts and at scale via messaging platforms commonly used by clients.
With OpenAI’s $250,000 award, the IRC hopes to reach at least 10,000 teachers and caregivers in protracted and acute crises in areas such as Northeast Nigeria, Colombia, and Bangladesh through this project, thus indirectly impacting at least half a million students. By integrating with OpenAI’s ChatGPT, the IRC will be able to rapidly create content, support overstretched teachers and personalize digital education experiences for improved learning outcomes and teacher empowerment, while researching the effectiveness of AI in education in safe and ethical ways.
Teachers and learning facilitators are at the heart of every education system. But in conflict and crisis settings, teachers lack resources to support children who face unique challenges, which can include trauma, missed years of education, or unfamiliar languages and curriculum. Now more than ever, the humanitarian sector needs an injection of innovation to unlock progress without burdening already overstretched and under-resourced services and systems.
“With more people displaced than ever, the evolving and growing nature of the global refugee crisis requires not just more aid, but new thinking too,” said David Miliband, President and CEO of the IRC. “As the IRC leans into further leveraging artificial intelligence, we are thrilled to work with OpenAI, who are supporting our work in developing innovative solutions to solve one the biggest challenges faced in crisis-affected communities around the world - effectively delivering education at the last mile.”
"Generative AI can give teachers and caregivers in crisis zones new ways of reaching vulnerable students who need the kind of personalized instruction and educational support that would otherwise be out of reach," said Anna Makanju, OpenAI's vice president of Global Affairs. "OpenAI is proud to support the IRC's innovative efforts to use artificial intelligence to provide vital assistance to refugees and other displaced people around the world."