21 September 2026
AI for Good 2.0 from Apps for Good – New for September 2026! CAS Secondary event
If you were unable to join us for AI for Good 2.0 from Apps for Good – New for September 2026! online community meeting, don’t worry! You can catch up on all the content and a recording of the session below.
AI for Good 2.0: Moving Young People from AI Users to AI Creators
Hosted by the CAS AI and Secondary Communities, this online session introduced AI for Good 2.0, Apps for Good’s new project-based computing course for young people. Led by Senior Education Manager Jodie Campbell, the meeting explored how teachers can help pupils understand artificial intelligence, consider its wider impact and use it creatively to tackle real-world problems.
Key Takeaways
- AI for Good 2.0 is designed to help pupils move from being passive users of technology towards becoming more confident and purposeful creators.
- The course combines AI literacy with project-based learning, giving pupils opportunities to design AI-powered apps around issues that matter to them.
- Responsible use is built into the learning, with attention given to AI safety, wellbeing, misinformation and critical engagement with technology.
- Industry engagement gives pupils an opportunity to present their ideas to technology professionals and receive authentic feedback on their projects.
- Computing knowledge sits alongside broader skills such as problem solving, creativity, communication and teamwork throughout the Apps for Good approach.
From using AI to understanding and creating with it
AI is already part of many young people’s digital lives. The challenge for computing teachers is therefore increasingly not whether pupils will encounter AI, but what sort of understanding they develop around it.
That formed an important starting point for the session.
Jodie Campbell introduced Apps for Good as an education charity built around the belief that young people can shape their futures through technology. Its new course is principally aimed at Key Stage 3 pupils, or S1–S3 in Scotland, although the materials can be adapted for other age groups. The intention is for pupils to build AI-powered apps addressing challenges they care about, while developing both computing knowledge and wider skills.
One phrase from the session captured the underlying approach particularly clearly: moving young people from passive users of technology towards more confident creators.
That distinction is worth considering in our own classrooms. Pupils may already be experienced users of recommendation systems, chatbots, image generators and other AI-powered services, but regular use does not necessarily translate into understanding.
How often do our lessons create opportunities for pupils to ask how these systems work, what their limitations are and what decisions sit behind their design?
Teaching AI in the context of real problems
Rather than approaching AI entirely as an abstract technical topic, AI for Good 2.0 uses project-based learning and social impact as its context.
Jodie explained that pupils might work on challenges ranging from climate change to issues within their own communities. Along the way, the course aims to strengthen computing and essential skills, build pupils’ confidence with technology and broaden their awareness of careers within the digital sector.
This provides an interesting curriculum question.
When pupils learn a computing concept, how much does the context surrounding the activity affect their engagement with it?
A machine learning activity based around a problem pupils recognise may prompt quite different conversations from an isolated technical exercise. At the same time, the context should support rather than obscure the computing being learned. The useful question is therefore not simply whether a project is engaging, but what computing knowledge pupils are developing through that engagement.
Apps for Good described its courses as combining curriculum-related digital skills with the essential skills set out in the Skills Builder Universal Framework. Teacher and pupil feedback has also been used in the development of the new resources.
Developing critical AI literacy
The course has been updated partly in response to the changing digital environment pupils are growing up in.
During the session, Jodie highlighted concerns around areas such as safety, wellbeing and misinformation, alongside the opportunities presented by AI. The intention is to equip pupils to navigate those issues with greater confidence while also exploring how AI might be used positively.
That balance is important.
AI education can easily become either a demonstration of interesting tools or a catalogue of risks. A stronger curriculum may need both technical and critical perspectives: pupils understanding what AI can do while also questioning outputs, recognising limitations and considering the consequences of how systems are designed and used.
For teachers, that might mean asking whether pupils are being given enough opportunities to interrogate AI rather than simply operate it.
When an AI system produces an answer, for example, do pupils ask where that answer might have come from? When a model classifies an image incorrectly, do they investigate why? When designing their own system, do they consider who could be affected by errors?
These conversations can help ethical issues become part of computing practice rather than something added on at the end.
A three-module journey
The session also gave an overview of how AI for Good 2.0 is structured.
The course is modular. Module 1 introduces what AI is, where it appears in the world and how pupils can engage with it critically.
Module 2 uses climate action as its theme and introduces the process of designing an AI app, with different possible routes for creating it.
Module 3 then moves towards a larger student-led project. Pupils generate an idea, design their own app and ultimately build it using what they have learnt earlier in the course.
Apps for Good’s current course information describes the full programme as 12 lessons across three modules, with coding and AI-assisted creation pathways available.
The progression from understanding, through guided application, to independent creation is one that computing departments might recognise from other parts of the curriculum.
It also raises a useful planning question: when pupils complete an open-ended computing project, have we explicitly taught enough of the component knowledge beforehand for them to make meaningful choices independently?
Bringing industry into the classroom
Another substantial feature discussed was Apps for Good’s Industry Engagement programme.
Teachers can arrange for volunteers working in technology and the wider digital economy to join a class virtually. Student teams present their app ideas and receive feedback and suggestions from someone working professionally in the sector.
The purpose is not simply careers education. Feedback can help pupils refine their ideas, consider whether a proposed solution is practical and think more carefully about the people who might use it.
There is potential here for authentic assessment too.
Pupils often produce work primarily for their teacher. Asking them to explain a project to an external audience changes the communication challenge. They need to explain the problem they are trying to solve, justify decisions and respond to questions from someone who was not involved in the development process.
Apps for Good says these virtual industry sessions are free and can be arranged around the needs of the school. Its wider programme continues to embed contact with industry alongside classroom learning.
Celebrating what pupils create
The session also introduced the Apps for Good National Showcase.
Teams completing the course can submit their ideas to the annual event. Pupils receive feedback from industry professionals, with selected teams having opportunities to pitch their projects to judging panels.
Jodie described this as a way of celebrating student talent from across the UK and highlighted previous involvement from organisations including Spotify, LEGO and OVO.
For teachers, competitions and showcases can provide a useful sense of audience and purpose, even when winning is not the main objective.
There may also be value in reproducing some of this approach at a smaller scale within school. Could pupils demonstrate their projects to another class? Could sixth-formers review Key Stage 3 ideas? Could local employers, governors or parents act as an audience?
Knowing that someone beyond the classroom will see a project can change how pupils approach both its technical quality and the clarity with which they explain it.
Next Steps
The session offers several useful prompts when considering AI teaching within our own departments.
Questions to consider
- Are pupils learning how AI works, or mainly learning how to operate AI-powered products?
- Where in our curriculum do pupils have opportunities to question bias, misinformation, safety and the wider consequences of AI systems?
- Could a real-world problem provide a stronger context for teaching a computing concept we already cover?
- Do our programming and AI projects give pupils genuine choices, while retaining clear and assessable computing outcomes?
- How often do pupils have to explain and defend their technical decisions to someone other than their teacher?
- Could industry engagement strengthen either our computing curriculum or our careers provision?
- Are pupils given opportunities to consider technology as something they can shape, rather than something created elsewhere for them to consume?
Further Resources
Apps for Good: AI for Good 2.0
Apps for Good Educator Dashboard