The course “Introduction to Artificial Intelligence” in the Mechanical Engineering program at Chalmers is quite in the zeitgeist, with its focus on machine learning using neural networks. According to Bernhard Mehlig, teaching a popular subject has its advantages — but it also requires a great deal of effort and dedication to truly connect with the students.
“Many students are highly interested in the subject, which makes it fun to teach. I feel it is important to motivate students to attend lectures on campus, primarily to meet and discuss the topic with each other. We teachers must make an effort to keep students on campus! It’s not easy to consistently maintain the same level as a teacher, so it feels especially rewarding when students find the teaching valuable,” says Bernhard Mehlig.
The course aims to explain how machine learning algorithms work — and how they fail. This requires mathematical reasoning. According to Bernhard, students find this both challenging, exciting, and enjoyable.
The effort proved successful, and Bernhard was pleasantly surprised with receiving the The Golden Pointer, an honorary award given out by the Mechanical Engineering program and the Mechanical Engineering Student Section at Chalmers.
“I was very happy when I saw the bouquet and the diploma this morning. It was inspiring to teach the course — there was a lot of dialogue and discussions with the students. I look forward to teaching it again next year.”
In a handwritten letter, Bernhard’s students wrote:
"Thank you for raising the bar and keeping our education fun, interresting, and challenging".
Text: Carolina Svensson
