AI for High School: Privacy and Ethics
Students analyze facial recognition technology, algorithmic bias, and the tradeoffs among privacy, safety, fairness, and efficiency.
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AI for High School: Privacy and Ethics
Approximate Total Time: 5 lessons (approximately 4.5–5 hours total; Lesson 5 is approximately 90 minutes)
Recommended for Ages 14+ (high school)
About This Unit
In this unit, students examine how artificial intelligence impacts privacy, surveillance, decision-making, and society. Through a multi-lesson investigation centered on a fictional airport security case, students explore how AI systems collect and use data, make predictions, and influence real-world decisions.
Students analyze facial recognition technology, algorithmic bias, and the tradeoffs among privacy, safety, fairness, and efficiency. They investigate how AI affects different stakeholders, evaluate the benefits and risks of AI adoption across industries, and engage in structured debate about ethical AI use. By the end of the unit, students can critically evaluate AI systems, identify the human choices that shape technological outcomes, and develop informed perspectives on responsible AI use.
Lessons
1. Privacy and Surveillance
Students investigate how AI systems collect and use personal and biometric data, explore facial recognition technology, and evaluate tradeoffs between privacy, surveillance, and public safety.
2. AI and Decision Making
Students investigate how data selection, weighting, system goals, and human choices influence AI predictions. They distinguish AI predictions from human decisions and design safeguards for safer, fairer, and more accountable AI use.
3. Turning People into Data
Students train and test a simplified facial recognition model, explore how images become numerical patterns, and investigate how training data influence model accuracy, confidence, and limitations.
4. AI in the Real World
Students analyze AI systems from multiple stakeholder perspectives, examining who benefits, who may be harmed, and how privacy, fairness, efficiency, and human judgment create real-world tradeoffs.
5. AI Ethics Debate
Students represent different stakeholder groups in a structured debate about AI-related ethical dilemmas involving privacy, surveillance, fairness, transparency, and human oversight. They defend evidence-based positions while considering competing priorities and tradeoffs.