2 education efforts from Finland and Brazil have actually been named laureates of the 2026 UNESCO King Hamad Bin Isa Al-Khalifa Prize for making use of Details and Interaction Technologies (ICTs) in Education, recognising their innovative approaches to utilizing artificial intelligence to strengthen imagination, vital thinking and student firm.
The 2 winning initiatives are “Generation AI,” jointly developed by the University of Eastern Finland, the University of Helsinki and the University of Oulu, and “Redação Paraná,” a digital education program led by the State Secretariat of Education of Paraná (SEED-PR), Brazil.
They were selected from more than 100 nominations sent by UNESCO Member States and organisations in official collaboration with the UN firm.
The award event occurred on 9 September 2026 at UNESCO headquarters in Paris as part of Digital Learning Week, held under the style, “Education in the age of AI: Realities|Frictions|Frontiers.”
The recognition comes as education systems come to grips with a central difficulty of generative AI: how to harness progressively capable technologies without enabling them to displace trainees’ independent reasoning, creativity and judgement.
Finland’s Generation AI puts students at the centre
Introduced in 2022, Generation AI is an AI education program collectively established by the University of Eastern Finland, the University of Helsinki and the University of Oulu, alongside other stakeholders.
The program offers evidence-based tools, products and classroom activities developed to move students from passive users of AI to vital and creative individuals in forming the technology.
Its method centres on learner voice, firm and participation, using inquiry-based and co-design methodologies that place students as makers, private investigators and future shapers of AI systems.
Rather than merely teaching students how to operate AI tools, Generation AI encourages them to investigate how AI systems work, analyze their implications and think about alternative methods they might be developed and used.
The programme’s materials have been accessed more than 200,000 times across over 50 countries, while workshops and school interventions have actually involved around 1,500 students and teachers.
According to UNESCO, the effort has demonstrated favorable results on trainees’ scientific reasoning and ethical reflection on AI and digital media, along with their ability to discern, discuss and critique advanced aspects of AI systems.
Brazil uses AI to strengthen composing instruction
Brazil’s Redação Paraná takes a various but complementary method, integrating a digital platform with public education policy to expand access to writing guideline across the state of Paraná.
Piloted in 2020 and executed totally in 2021, the program uses AI-assisted feedback together with instructor mediation.
Students resolve structured cycles of composing and revision, getting technology-supported feedback while continuing to engage with teachers throughout the knowing procedure.
The objective is not just to automate evaluation or produce composed work. Instead, AI is incorporated into the training process to reinforce trainees’ linguistic proficiency, argumentation, higher-order thinking and imagination.
The programme has reached approximately 850,000 students across 2,000 schools in Paraná.
UNESCO stated Redação Paraná has helped trainees develop their ability to think critically about real-world problems while enhancing argumentation and creative writing abilities.
Educators are also supported through structured training, enabling them to incorporate the programme’s resources successfully into classroom guideline.
Two designs, one concept
Edugist reports although the Finnish and Brazilian efforts operate in different educational contexts, their acknowledgment by UNESCO reflects a shared principle: AI must support much deeper knowing instead of replace the intellectual work of students and instructors.
Generation AI focuses on assisting students understand, question and seriously engage with AI itself, while Redação Paraná demonstrates how AI-assisted feedback can be incorporated into large-scale public education without eliminating instructors from the knowing process.
Together, the tasks show 2 crucial measurements of accountable AI usage in education: developing the capability to understand and seriously examine AI, while likewise finding out to use it purposefully as part of the knowing process.
That difference is ending up being increasingly essential as generative AI becomes more efficient in producing essays, descriptions, analyses and other kinds of material.
The instructional difficulty is therefore shifting from merely teaching students how to use AI to ensuring they can assess its outputs, establish their own concepts, make notified judgements and remain active individuals in the knowing process.
Lessons for Africa
The UNESCO acknowledgment carries particular relevance for education systems across Africa, where policymakers and schools are increasingly checking out AI amidst consistent challenges around instructor lacks, discovering outcomes, digital gain access to and educational inequality.
AI could assist expand access to discovering resources, support instructors, personalise knowing and improve academic material. However unequal access to devices and connectivity, minimal teacher preparation and weak digital infrastructure could likewise strengthen existing inequalities.
The experiences of Finland and Paraná suggest that efficient AI adoption needs more than innovation. Pedagogy, instructor capability and student company must remain main to execution.
For African policymakers and education leaders, the concern is for that reason not simply whether schools ought to adopt AI, but how AI can be deployed without damaging the thinking, imagination and judgement that education is meant to develop.
The 2026 UNESCO ICT Prize uses 2 practical examples of approaches looking for to answer that question.
As artificial intelligence ends up being progressively ingrained in classrooms, the strongest designs may eventually be those that utilize innovation not to make students believe less, however to assist them question more, produce more and believe more deeply.