Google this year published a series of internal AI training resources originally developed for its engineers. Since then, the Machine Learning Crash Course has been updated with an image classification practicum. This July, Google is bringing the program to India via in-person sessions.
On the consumer front, India is a very important market for Google with a Next Billion Users team developing specialized products and optimized features. Equally important is encouraging local developers to develop services for the platform, with Google noting that “the AI ecosystem is nascent but is developing rapidly” in India.
With companies of all sizes adopting AI in their solutions, there is a clear and present need for trained and technically-equipped developers to drive these AI-related challenges and projects. To help facilitate this, Google signed a Statement of Intent with NITI Aayog earlier this year to jointly work towards building the AI ecosystem in India.
Google and the country’s National Institution for Transforming India are working together to build out AI capabilities and “raise the technical proficiency of the participants.” The MLCC is already available online in English with exercises, interactive visualizations, and instructional videos.
For India, Google is launching the MLCC Study Jam Series that involves “free, community run, in-person study groups.”
MLCC covers numerous machine learning fundamentals, from basic concepts such as loss function and gradient descent, then building through more advanced theories like classification models and neural networks. The programming exercises include the basics of TensorFlow — our open-source machine learning framework — and also feature succinct videos from Google machine learning experts. Participants will be able to read short text lessons, and play with educational gadgets devised by Google’s instructional designers and engineers.