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05 February, 2020 Academic

Yuma speaks about AI at the World Youth Forum

Year 8 student, Yuma Soerianto (8M), was recently invited to speak at the 3rd Annual World Youth Forum, held in Sinai, Egypt from 14th-17th December.

Hosted by the Egyptian government, the Forum connected students from around the world and provided them with a platform to discuss, debate and share ideas on different topics, such as technology, art and the environment. Students had the opportunity to engage top policy-makers and influential officials, to address issues and create change.

Speaking to over 8,000 attendees, Yuma made up a panel of speakers, which included a lawyer, futurist, neuroscientist and robot, to discuss and share ideas surrounding the ethics of artificial intelligence.

This isn’t the first time Yuma has been invited to speak at the World Youth Forum, in 2017, he talked about leadership and was presented with an award by the President of Egypt for his inspirational work.

The Forum also provided Yuma with the chance to explore Egypt with its rich culture, heritage and history. Yuma particularly enjoyed meeting and speaking with people from different parts of the world, to better understand the diversity in culture.

  • yuma-speaks-about-ai-at-the-world-youth-forum
    The Egyptian President presenting Yuma with an award
  • yuma-speaks-about-ai-at-the-world-youth-forum

“I met so many interesting people and was able to hear some unbelievable stories. One of the attendees at the Forum is using artificial intelligence to detect the early stages of cancer, which is a great example of how technology can be used for good,” said Yuma.

From the age of six, Yuma had a strong interest in technology and was fascinated by how computers and phones worked. With a strong desire to learn how to code, Yuma found as many online tutorials as possible and taught himself the skills required to build websites and more.

“I started off by building websites, then moved into games too. I heard about this new programming language called Swift, which is used to make apps for Apple, and so I decided to make apps. To date, I have nine apps in the App Store and one of the games ‘Let’s Stack AR’, won ‘game of the day’.

With a strong social sense, Yuma is driven to make people’s lives easier and better.

“Sometimes, if I need inspiration for my apps, I think about the small things that impact people every day; the annoyances, then I find solutions for that. I’ve been making some small apps to solve small problems but hopefully, I can solve bigger problems once I finish school. Ultimately, I just want to help people, maybe people with disabilities or people who are blind. My goal is to make something that would help people and change the world.”Yuma Soerianto (8M)

Yuma has also been invited to speak at a key note session at Cisco Live, held in Melbourne from 3rd -6th March. The annual conference is set to draw over 8,500 attendees to discuss digital transformation and cutting-edge technologies.

We congratulate Yuma on all he has achieved and look forward to following his journey at St Michael’s and beyond. More information about Yuma and his achievements can be viewed on his website or via Twitter.