"We initiated WAI Taiwan to inspire more women to get involved in AI"

My name is Linien Yen, the Ambassador of WAI in Taiwan. We started the WAI Taiwan chapter in July, 2020. Together with a team that consists of Bruce Bateman (my mentor) Emma Yang (my working partner) and our two best volunteers: Freiya Hsu and Hsiu-Chu Hsu.

How it all started

Linien Yen, WAI Ambassador Taiwan

Back in 2017, I was working in Italy for a start-up as an AI app product manager. Completely blown away by how and what AI can do, at the same time, I was surprised by how much this field has been male dominated. Hence, I started to look for a community that supports females in AI. That's how I found WAI Milan and when I returned to Taiwan, I decided to develop a WAI Taiwan community to support and inspire more women to get involved in AI.

seven events and 400 followers in Just one year

In July 2020, we had first our launch event with theme of "Says who - that AI has nothing to do with you". This event was considered successful as more than 70% of registered people attended. Since then we cooperated with Women in IoT and Women Techmaker to organize the events covering topics from digitalization to AI panel discussion about AI products.

We also cooperated with Skyrock Projects to teach children under age of 10 to learn coding and robots. We also work with professors from different universities to organize the AI events for senior high and university students. Currently, we are planning to develop young women in AI to build up the influence on campus with support of university professors.

Within almost one year, we have organized seven events and gained more than 400 followers. Currently we are working on an international event, 2021 WAI APAC Hackathon and a domestic coding workshop for senior high school students in Taiwan.

What's next in Taiwan

For next half of 2021, we are planning a series of online events about AI and mental health, domestic violence, depression and etc.

As we believe that post Covid-19, we are subject to anxiety, frustration and a various of mental issues more than ever. So, it will be interesting to know how AI can help us or how we can help each other from the AI-related research.

If you are interested in supporting us to inspire more women involved in AI, please do get in touch with us via Facebook or Instagram.