January, 2023.- With the participation of more than 100 students from different countries, the first MIT-Chile Human Centered AI & Visualization Research Workshop was held on the San Joaquín campus of the Catholic University of Chile.

At the event, presentations and talks were held on topics ranging from biases in natural language, machine learning, brain-computer interactions, and activities from storytelling with data and a live demonstration of an electroencephalography.

The idea of creating this workshop originated at the beginning of June 2022. Shortly after, the organizers, Denis Parra, a researcher at the Millennium Institute Foundational Research on Data and an academic at the Department of Computer Science at the P. Universidad Católica de Chile, Maggie Hughes, PhD candidate in Media Arts and Sciences in the Center for Constructive Communication at the MIT Media Lab, and led by Belén Saldías, Ph.D. Candidate at MIT’s Center for Constructive Communication, began contacting sponsors and exhibitors to organize the event. “Opportunities like these are rare in Latin America, and even more so those like this one that are free and provide funding for participants in remote regions,” explains Belén Saldías.

The organization designed the daily lectures with the aim of motivating participants to join in discussions on the cutting edge of people-focused artificial intelligence research. Active learning activities and also opportunities to generate networking were created. The participating students received materials prior to the conference, to better prepare: they had access to review documents, homework, personal data visualization exercises, and reflections on research questions.

At the end of the sessions, the participants highlighted the opportunity to participate in student-led discussions, which allowed them to take advantage of the research opportunities and the results of the presentations.

The activity was supported by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT Global Experiences; the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, the National Center for Artificial Intelligence, CenIA; the Millennium Institute for Engineering and Artificial Intelligence for Health, iHealth; the Millennium Institute Foundational Research on Data; and sponsored by MIT Media Lab, Agrosuper, Amazon Web Services and HAI-VIS, Human-centered Artificial Intelligence and Visualization group at Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile.