West Allegheny Partners with CMU to Explore Human-Centered AI
- West Allegheny School District
- 9 hours ago
- 6 min read
A Regional Partnership Empowering Students to Reimagine the Future of Education
West Allegheny School District was honored to be a recipient of this year’s Moonshot Grant, powered by Remake Learning, and funded by the Grable Foundation. The grant project titled Human-Centered AI (HCAI) as a Pathway to Re-envisioning K-12 Education is a unique learning opportunity for high school students. Throughout this school year, twenty seniors from four local school districts are engaging with faculty from Carnegie Mellon University’s College of Engineering to explore human-centered design and artificial intelligence to drive change for school communities. This initiative challenges the boundaries between school and real life while fostering a learning culture that values experimentation and even failure as an integral part of growth and design.
School districts joining West Allegheny in this venture are Cornell, Peters Township, and South Fayette, with each school invited to send five seniors and a faculty advisor. West Allegheny named Lexie Adams, Audrey Carlisle, Diego Jofre Leiva, Logan McFall, and Jake Stelmack as their student representatives with Matt McBurney serving as the faculty advisory.
To learn more about this innovative project, West Allegheny marketing and communications student interns Adelyn McClelland and Nathalia Canelhas interviewed CMU’s Dr. Chris McComb and his two graduate assistants, Aslan Noorghasemi and Jessica Ezemba.
Q: Why was the partnership between West Allegheny and CMU started, and how did it develop?
A: Dr. McComb: “I need to give credit to West A and to Dr. Lippert, Dr. Roche, and Dr. Nelson for reaching out to CMU and getting this started. Sharing our expertise in AI engineering design with local schools is one way that my lab can be a better Pittsburgh community member. Knowing that, it became a question of how do we take the first step? So we started putting together some ideas…ideas that bring together people who have never worked together to try to do something special.”
Q: What do you hope students will get out of this project?
A: Ezemba: We know it (AI) is a very powerful technology, and the way it’s being developed right now will probably influence the way it’s going to be applied in everyday life in the future. There’s a very important part of this, which is the human-centered part, which is how do we use AI in the design process. This partnership hopefully should be able to get them (students) thinking about the human-centered part as they continue to use different tools and services where AI is being applied.”
Q: What is your end goal for the students participating in this project?
A: Noorghasemi: “CMU’s Head of Mechanical Engineering, Dr. Jonathan Cagan, wrote a book called “Managing the Unmanageable,” in which he argues the ultimate goal is to make change makers. I think what we are doing right now aligns well with this philosophy. We are trying to help students become real change makers who are capable of solving real world problems which are fairly complex and make a better world to live in for us all.”
Q: Why is HCAI an important and timely area for our students to explore?
A: Dr. McComb: “I think that a lot of people are making the implicit assumption that humanity needs to drastically change in the face of AI. We need to change a little, but I think it’s otherwise overblown. We are making this technology to serve people, and if we are saying that people will have to change to make technology useful, we don’t fully understand the technology and how it can serve us. We need to recognize that we have control over AI, and we don’t need to design things that are going to get rid of jobs. We can design things that make life experiences more joyful and valuable.”
McClelland and Canelhas also interviewed West Allegheny’s student representatives, all of whom plan to continue their education at a four-year university, to hear their perspective.
Q: Can you define HCAI in your own words and share what you have learned so far.
A: McFall: “HCAI is making artificial intelligence human-focused on design so it’s easier and more usable for a person. It solves real life problems that everyone can relate to.”
Q: What have you worked on so far to support the implementation of HCAI in the classroom?
A: Adams: “We learned a lot about how to use AI to benefit somebody because it’s only as smart as the person using it. You can’t just expect it to be smart for you. We came up with a lot of student-, teacher-, and school-based ideas on how to implement AI into the classroom in a manner that is both beneficial to the teacher and the student. Now we are narrowing them down to choose one to focus on.”
Q: How do you think HCAI can directly help school districts?
A: Stelmack: “My group project is based around how high schools schedule their classes. We developed an AI class scheduler, this is based on a students’ desired major, it will make a schedule using the school’s Program of Studies. Students can enter other parameters such as ‘I need this number of AP classes, or I need a band course for marching band,’ and it makes a schedule for you. The way I tested it was to make a schedule for myself, and I got it to work. During scheduling, many students have questions for their counselors. This technology would allow the counselors to have more time to help students directly.”
Q: What is one thing you have learned that has really stuck with you?
A: Carlisle: “During the sessions, we’ve learned valuable skills like teamwork, prototyping, leadership, and design empathy—which is a user-centered approach to designing in which it takes into account the specific needs and wants of a person.”
Q: What common misconceptions have you identified about HCAI?
A: Jofre Leiva: “Many people believe AI is here to replace them in their jobs. But I think that it’s made to actually help people with their jobs and with what they’re doing. Human-centered AI is just a tool to help humans be more efficient, faster and better at their job.”
Q: What is a key takeaway about HCAI that you think people should know?
A: McFall: “It’s a tool not a weapon. It’s supposed to make AI more approachable. We want to take this existing tool and make it more accessible and specific to where it can be applied to teachers and students.”
Across projects, a common theme has emerged: AI is most valuable when it is specific, transparent, and guided by strong human judgment. As a faculty advisor for the project, McBurney shared that what he finds impactful is “the fact that it is human-centered. It allows us to focus on the idea that AI doesn’t just need to be for you or a personal task, it’s better when you design something that is bettering other people.” When asked about the goal of re-envisioning education, he added, “The first step, if you’re designing something for education, is to know what problem you’re trying to solve. As the student groups get better at thinking about that and talking to stakeholders, they can take it to the AI and say, ‘Here’s what we want to fix, and here’s what we are going to develop.’”
Since the start of the school year, participants have visited several regional technology hubs, including the Manufacturing Futures Institute at Mill 19, Ansys, CMU’s Integrated Innovation Institute, and Duolingo. The next session will take place at the CMU’s Entertainment Technology Center. The project will culminate in a Shark Tank-style pitch event at the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild in April. The panel of judges will include school board members from each participating district and representatives from the program’s funders.
At the mid-point of the project, students reflected on their experiences and the value of cross-district collaboration throughout this partnership. Working with new peers provided what one student described as “a collection of experience,” offering new reference points for how different schools operate, think, and solve problems, ultimately leading to better ideas and less bias. Additionally, learning in and from regional technology leaders has deepened participants’ understanding of the industry. Students shared that the skills gained through this project, especially around human-centered design thinking, will benefit them in their future studies and careers.
West Allegheny School District is proud to be working closely with CMU and the participating school districts throughout this initiative and plans to secure funding to continue into future years.
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