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Artificial Intelligence (AI) is no longer a futuristic dream, it’s already shaping economies, job markets, healthcare, education, and even our cultural heritage.
For Black communities across the globe, this powerful technology offers both unprecedented opportunities and serious risks.
Experts, educators, and advocates are urging African-Americans to not just engage with AI but to lead in shaping it, warning that failure to do so could deepen long-standing inequalities.
Across countries like the United States, projects like STEM City Baltimore are already planting seeds of hope. Tucked inside the historic Thurgood Marshall Amenity Center, the new tech hub is giving young people in West Baltimore a window into AI and robotics, tools many of them had never seen up close.
The center is not just about computers and coding. It’s about access, equity, and preparing Black youth for high-paying, future-ready careers. STEM City Baltimore offers more than education, it provides empowerment. With hands-on exhibits, coding labs, and mentorship from Black professionals in STEM, the center works to bridge the digital divide in a city plagued by generational poverty and underfunded schools.
Students are learning critical skills like data science and machine learning, which experts say will dominate the job market in the coming years. They’re not just preparing for jobs, they’re preparing to become innovators and leaders in AI.
However, while initiatives like STEM City show the upside, recent studies and reports highlight growing concerns that AI could also widen racial disparities, particularly in finance, employment, and healthcare.
A 2024 class action lawsuit against Navy Federal Credit Union alleges discriminatory lending practices driven by algorithmic decision-making. According to the suit, more than half of Black loan applicants were denied, compared to just 23% of white applicants.
The problem, civil rights experts say, is not just human bias, but machine bias. Many banks now use AI models to evaluate loan applications. But these models are only as fair as the data they’re trained on.
“There is this idea that tech feels neutral because it has mathematical and logical backing, but we want to remind people that math often has a political perspective when applied in the real world.” Dr. Sanmi Koyejo, president of the Black in AI organization told Stanford HAI
To address these dangers, the Stanford University researchers presented a white paper to the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), titled “Exploring the Impact of AI on Black Americans.”
The paper urges lawmakers to embed civil rights protections into AI policy, not just in theory, but in practice.
“When we think of safety, we think about it broadly in terms of safety of the models, but what we want is to think about safety in terms of communities and how these tools are distributed. Safety isn’t solely an issue of “Is this model safe or not?” It should have a broader definition to include the people who use it and the different risk levels for those people.” said Rohini Kosoglu, a policy fellow at Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered AI.
Kosoglu stressed that while AI is often discussed in terms of national security or tech innovation, it’s also a matter of access, opportunity, and justice. From healthcare to education, AI is already influencing decisions that shape people’s lives and Black communities cannot afford to be on the sidelines.
In education, AI tools can personalize learning and close achievement gaps. However, without proper oversight, they could collect sensitive data from underserved students without proper protection.
In healthcare, AI has the potential to detect diseases faster and more accurately, but most models are trained on data that underrepresents Black patients, potentially leading to harmful misdiagnoses.
The environmental cost of AI is another often overlooked concern. As companies race to build the next generation of powerful AI tools, massive computing resources are needed, sometimes requiring new power plants.
According to Koyejo, the extraction of raw materials and placement of these energy infrastructures often occurs in or near marginalized communities.
“….the resources required to build them, raw material needs, the repeated experience is that the extraction of resources is largely from marginalized communities, and they are the ones who are routinely exploited. We call this out as a threat to these communities and something that needs to be paid attention to by policymakers,” he said.
Still, there is real optimism about how AI can uplift the Black community, particularly through entrepreneurship and cultural preservation. AI is lowering the barrier to entry for small businesses by automating tasks like market analysis and customer engagement.
For creatives, generative AI is opening doors. Black artists and writers can use these tools to produce content faster and share stories that might otherwise go untold.
One groundbreaking example is the CollinAI GPT Library, the world’s first AI-powered digital library focused on women and minorities in STEM. This platform not only celebrates Black excellence but ensures these contributions are documented and accessible for future generations.
For African-Americans, the AI revolution presents a crossroads. It’s a call to prepare, participate, and advocate. Experts say the community must move from being passive consumers to active creators of AI systems.
“We must see AI not as something that’s happening to us, but something we can shape,” said Koyejo.
This means more Black voices in AI policy. More students in AI classrooms. More entrepreneurs building AI-powered businesses. And more community members demanding accountability from tech companies and lawmakers.
Artificial Intelligence is transforming the world, and the Black community must not be left behind. By investing in education, demanding fairness, and pushing for representation, African-Americans can turn AI into a force for equity, not exclusion.
By: Joshua Narh