Podcast/Video Interviews by Stephen Ibaraki

A Chat with Valeria Soler: Young AI Leaders Bogotá political scientist working on how AI should be governed; leads ECCI University's Master's in AI, Leadership & Future Foresight; Founded Women in AI Colombia

This week, Stephen Ibaraki has an exclusive interview with Valeria Soler.

Valeria Soler is a young Colombian political scientist and designer who works on how AI should be governed. Her central question: as machines do more of our thinking, how do we make sure young people still learn to think for themselves?

She founded and leads Young AI Leaders Bogotá Foundation, part of the UN's AI for Good youth network, and started Women in AI Colombia, the first chapter in South America, which now has more than 4,500 community members. She heads the Master's in AI at ECCI University and is a World Economic Forum Global Shaper. Her teams have launched startups, run hackathons, and helped hundreds of people build careers in technology that serves the public good. She also helped shape an AI agreement among 17 Latin American countries.

She has spoken at the UN in Geneva, in the UAE, and in Japan, arguing that people who study society should help build technology, not just react to it. She studied political science and design at Universidad de los Andes and has worked in startups, government, universities, and consulting. She is also one of 30 GCYLP fellows, organized by the ITU in partnership with Huawei.