Simulation - Innovation - Action

What is Simuvaction©? It is an opportunity for 20-40 university students from across the world to actively engage, practice, and contribute to the ethical development of AI. Students, coming from different fields, universities, backgrounds, and countries, train for 6-8 weeks through a common course in which they receive guidance from academic and professional partners.

Specifically, students write, debate, and vote on one of the most challenging AI quandaries: How can we ensure that AI, designed to help address inequities does not, in fact, increase such disparities?

The project fuses graduate student minds, the world of academia, the private and non-profit sectors, and community organizations engaged in issues of equity and disparity. It provides an opportunity for all participants to meet, discuss, and act around a common goal and project. 

Highlights from the 2024 Simuvaction© Program

The Simuvaction© exercise creates its own organic ecosystem through multi-layered objectives. Beyond the academic exercise for the students, the program strengthens connections between academic, economic, institutional, and non-governmental organizations. AI and Healthcare expert-led conferences, contacts with the Embassies of assigned delegations, coaching with real businesses and NGOs (for the journalist and lobbyist teams), are integral parts of the course and therefore, an opportunity for the colleges and communities to cross their interests, develop their networks and foresee further collaboration.

 

This ecosystem empowers:

Students to practice active learning, which:

  • fills the gap between their studies and the professional world.
  • ​offers them an opportunity to discover themselves, out of their comfort zone, on a professional stage.
  • enhances the links between knowledge, know-how, and interpersonal skills, through multi-disciplinary teamwork.

Academic institutions to consider new pathways for collaboration, through:

  • the preparation and the simulation game between different academic partners.
  • strengthening and expanding such partnerships in Higher Education.

Communities to creativelyengage with each other, while:

  • strengthening connections between academic, economic, institutional, and non-profit actors.
  • providing an opportunity to work through the different facets of an issue by participating in conferences with experts in the field, by creating contacts with the Consulates of the represented delegation, and by coaching from lobbyists-teams with businesses, associations, and NGOs.

New ways to develop international thinking, and:

  • The project aims to reflect the Think Globally, Act Locally We consider that “local problems have global connections and implications, and these problems cannot be solved by individuals in a single country” (see NAIR Indira, WHITEHEAD Michele, Models of Global Learning, 2017, v).
  • Thinking globally requires both a sense of identification and enhanced creativity in problem-solving to truly think and engage in global problems.  

 A Student's Perspective

Simuvaction© AI 2025 Information

Please download a brief information guide for the 2025 program:

Professors here.

Students here.

FAQs

What is it? A simulation of an international meeting on AI governance on a global scale. 

Program Purpose? to represent specific stakeholders and draft, discuss, and vote for actionable recommendations about a scenario involving AI and Disparities on a Global Stage, before 5 pm on the D-day (April 9, 2025)

Dates for 2025?

  • Virtual sessions begin January 20, 2025 at kick-off meeting via Zoom
  • In-person session April 6-10 at University Laval Quebec, Quebec City, Quebec, which includes coaching and awards for Simuvaction D-Day.
  • Conference on April 10 on "De/Re-skilling with AI"

Location? Via Zoom from January 20 to April 5 and in Quebec City from April 6 to April 10, 2025 

Cost: Students are responsible for their airfare to Quebec (Note: it is less expensive routed through Montreal) and meals, with the exception of D-Day and the conference (April 9 & 10). Accommodation is free (room shared for two or three students by gender). No tuition fees. 

How to enroll: As a student at a university or higher education program, you should express your interest in participating in Simuvaction 2025 to your professor, who will then agree to your participation and communicate with Dr. Courrier at acourri@emory.edu.

For more student testimonials please visit videos of Clara, Daphne, Michael, and Katie.