Artificial Intelligence in the Curriculum of Economic Universities - Problems, Challenges and Solutions

VELEV, Dimiter (dgvelev@unwe.bg)

Dr. Dimiter Velev is a professor with the Department of Information Technologies and Communications at the University of National and World Economy (UNWE), Sofia, Bulgaria. He holds a M.Sc. degree in Electro-Engineering from the Sofia Technical University, Bulgaria and a Ph.D. degree in Computer systems, Complexes, Systems and Networks from the Pukhov Institute for Modeling in Energy Engineering at the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. 

Prof. Velev’s main areas of academic and R&D interest are information technology, web science, cloud computing, mobile computing, online social networks, natural disasters, risk management, integrated information systems for disaster management, applied artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and extended reality.

Prof. Velev is a regular chair and a keynote speaker of conferences in Asia and Europe, and a reviewer of many scientific publications in journals and conferences. He has published more than 200 ICT-related papers.

Prof. Dimiter Velev is the Director of the Science Research Center for Disaster Risk Reduction at UNWE. He is also a member of the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP), http://ifip.org/, in which he is the:

• Vice-chair of  IFIP Domain Committee on Cloud Computing, 
• Vice-chair of IFIP TC5 New Activities and Interdisciplinary Research;
• Secretary of IFIP WG 5.15 Information Technology in Disaster Risk Reduction.

Research Overview

Artificial intelligence (AI) refers to the simulation of human intelligence in machines that are programmed to think like humans and replicate their actions. The term may also be applied to any machine that behaves like a human mind in learning and problem-solving. AI evolves very fast to benefit many different industries. AI gradually moves to a cross-disciplinary approach based on mathematics, computer science, linguistics, psychology, etc. The technology can be applied practicaly to any sector and industry. 

However, the impact of AI in education will depend on how learning and competence needs to be changed, especially as AI will be widely used in economy and the society. The aim of the paper is to identify the existing problems in teaching AI in economic universities in Bulgaria, challenges that must be overcomed and to provide provisions for suitable solutions in the cirruculum.

(Keywords: Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, Statistics, Programming, Economy.)