Technovation, a global technology education nonprofit, announced that two teams of girls and two family teams - representing Kazakhstan, Kuwait, India and Ireland - were named winners at its annual Technovation World Summit held virtually August 13-14. The two-day event brought together more than 1,000 members and supporters of the Technovation community from around the world. The Awards Ceremony, held during World Summit, is a culmination of the annual Technovation Girls and Technovation Families programs in which nearly 2,000 teams of girls (ages 10-18) and families (with children ages 8-16) are challenged to develop a mobile application or AI prototype to solve an issue they've identified in their community. This year, teams across 60 countries overcame incredible odds stemming from COVID-19 to participate with the support of more than 3,500 mentors and chapter ambassadors. All finalists will receive a portion of the nearly $30,000 being awarded.

You've seen the headlines about robots coming after your jobs, but a new report debunks the fears and finds Americans are less worried about automation in the workplace than it may seem. And it was those "ample fear-based, rhetoric-filled headlines" that prompted the report, Americans' Perceptions of the Future of Work, by the business process outsourcing provider Sykes. The survey of over 1,500 Americans across the US found that over two-thirds (67%) had a positive connotation with intelligent, automation-based technology. SEE: Artificial intelligence: A business leader's guide (free PDF) While that may be the case, demographics play a key role in Americans' perception of robots in the workplace, said Tara Chklovski, founder and CEO of Technovation, a global technology education nonprofit aimed at empowering girls in low-income communities. Technovation conducted its own survey in 2018 of 1,566 low-income families to get a sense of what people are feeling with respect to artificial intelligence and what their fears are.

Years ago my (then) 10 year old niece asked me what I do. I tried to explain to her that I work on this super-exciting thing called Distributed Software. She asked me - "When I go to Google and search for something - does what you do help me? After I started working in Artificial Intelligence (AI), I am much better able to explain to my now 11 year old daughter what I do. My daughter and her friends can already see how AI impacts their world, and thanks to advancements in AI technologies, they are already able to build their own AI to solve problems they see around them.