AI Literacy for Learners from Underserved Communities: Co-designing with Educators and Learners in Youth Organisation within South Africa

As the integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) continues to advance at an unprecedented pace, shaping individuals and societies, young learners are growing up in environments increasingly influenced by intelligent systems. This has prompted the global call for young learners to develop AI literacy essential to develop critical understanding, informed engagement and responsible use of AI systems. In response, studies have played a pivotal role in designing, developing, and implementing diverse approaches to introduce AI to learners towards developing AI literacy. However, these studies have predominantly emerged from and for developed and resourced context, creating a significant gap in the development and implementations of this approach within the underserved communities in South Africa. Learners from the underserved communities in South Africa are underrepresented in existing research in AI literacy and these initiatives, developed from the resourced and developed context may not aligned with the realities of the underserved communities in South Africa, due to their unique challenges shaped by socioeconomic status, lived experiences and educational contexts. Hence, a gap in the studies investigating AI literacy for learners in Africa has prompted calls for region-specific AI literacy research. Therefore, this study aim to develop AI Literacy learning program with learners and educators, adopting a co-design approach, to foster AI literacy among learners from the underserved communities in South Africa. This study will adopt a community-based co-design approach, positioning the learners and educators as equal design partners throughout the design process. Data will be gathered through interviews and co-design workshops,vfollowed by qualitative analysis to identify design requirements and effective learning strategies for the development of the AI literacy learning program. The expected outcomes will provides lesson for co-designing with learners and educators in Africa, generates practical design principles for integrating AI literacy into underserved learning settings in Africa and contributes to digital inclusion and empowerment by enabling learners from underserved in South Africa to engage critically and responsibly with AI technologies.