F3i Wraps Up Inaugural AI Launchpad Program for Community College and High School Students

This summer, F3 Innovate’s AI Launchpad brought together 30 high school and community college students from across the Central Valley to learn how artificial intelligence can be applied to challenges facing agriculture. The program was taught by Ryan Dinubilo, F3 Innovate's Director of Innovation and a Fresno State alumnus, and designed to address a gap we see across the region, California, and the country. While students are increasingly being introduced to AI, there is still a need for hands-on training that connects those tools to real industries, real data, and real problems in their own communities.

During the eight-week course, students worked with real agricultural data, including weather and sensor data, and learned how to organize it, look for patterns, and use it to build AI models. They tested how accurate those models were, learned why factors like incomplete data or bias can affect the results, and used cloud-based tools to work with larger datasets. They also practiced taking a real agricultural problem, like predicting frost risk, and turning the data into a recommendation or insight that a grower or other nontechnical audience could actually use.

The program was born out of the idea that as agriculture becomes more data- and technology-intensive, employers need people who can understand both the tools and the production challenges they can be used to solve. At the same time, F3 Innovate, through its talent development programs, is committed to helping students find pathways into the emerging careers and industries growing around them.

In 2027, F3i will host its next AI Launchpad cohort with educators across the Valley, giving teachers and faculty the tools to incorporate AI in their own classrooms. F3i will also be working to make the modules freely available through the Supercomputing Center portal.

Thank you to Microsoft TechSpark for supporting AI Launchpad, as well as Fresno State, Merced College, and other partners for helping us expand access to technology, technical skills, and career pathways across the Central Valley.

This article was published in the F3i Insights November newsletter on Substack.