Universities are changing the way they teach with the rise of AI, Toyota converts older cars into eco-friendly models and successful trial shows AI fighting wildfires.
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That’s all the tech news that’s trending right now. Welcome to Hashtag Trending. It’s Tuesday, January 17, and I am your host, Ashee Pamma.
Universities are forced to restructure some courses and take preventive measures, as AI tool ChatGPT surges in popularity, New York Times reported. University professors across the country are overhauling classrooms in response to ChatGPT, prompting a potentially huge shift in teaching and learning. Some professors are redesigning their courses entirely, making changes that include more oral exams, group work and handwritten assessments instead of typed ones. So far, New York City and Seattle public school systems have banned the tool on school Wi-Fi networks and devices to prevent cheating, even though students can easily find loopholes to access ChatGPT.
Source: The New York Times
Following criticism over EV production hesitancy, Toyota has announced it will convert older cars into more eco-friendly models. Speaking at an industry event in Tokyo, Toyota’s CEO said that the carmaker will swap sustainable technologies like fuel cells and electric engines into older cars, Business Insider reported. Toyota has been reluctant to produce electric vehicles due to high costs and low demand. Instead, the company produced hybrid alternatives, running on gasoline and electric. Despite its hesitancy to adopt EVs, the company still made a goal in December 2021 to sell 3.5 million EVs a year by 2030.
Source: Business Insider
In January 2022, The World Economic Forum launched the FireAID initiative to address the drastic rise in the frequency and severity of wildfires. Successfully piloted by Koç Holding in the South Aegean and West Mediterranean region of Türkiye in 2022, this AI-powered wildfire risk mapping and logistic planning project improved wildfire prediction by combining static and meteorological datasets and reduced both response time and risk to firefighters. Due to its success, the approach is being scaled for wider use.
Source: World Economic Forum
According to James Wittebols, Professor of Political Science at the University of Windsor, information literacy courses can help us understand our confirmation biases and fight misinformation. We tend to look for news sources that confirm our beliefs and align with our politics, a report by The Conversation says. A course taught by Wittebols explains that the same phenomenon that makes us poor judges of trustworthy news can also be turned around to make us better, more critical consumers of news and information. Students learn to assess news based on the characteristics of a news story: multiple, adversarial sources, the use of statistics and data in which the sources are named and can be accessed independently, the kinds of advertising present and whether it is related to the story.
Source: The Conversation
That’s all the tech news that’s trending right now. Hashtag Trending is a part of the ITWC Podcast network. Add us to your Alexa Flash briefings or your Google Home daily briefing. Make sure to sign up for our Daily IT Wire newsletter to get all the news that matters directly in your inbox every day. Also, catch the next episode of Hashtag Tendances, our weekly Hashtag Trending episode in French, which drops every Thursday morning. If you have a suggestion or a tip, drop us a line in the comments or via email. Thank you for listening, I’m Ashee Pamma.