What is this?

The Manifest JustAI project is not merely a software review activity, it is a pedagogical intervention that translates the theory of algorithmic justice into a digital praxis. The activity breaks with the linearity of written reports and enters the realm of evocative auditing, where knowledge is constructed through sensory perception and social critique.

Summary

The Community’s JustAI Manifest

This Technoethical Audit and Placemaking project invites students to step out of the role of passive EdTech consumers and become critical auditors of the tools that shape their academic lives. The activity utilizes the CTL model to deconstruct the myth of algorithmic neutrality and to propose a framework for community-based governance grounded in principles of justice and joy.

The project is divided into five main phases:

Part I: Capturing the Invisible (Identification) – A sensory and technical mapping of AI Creep within the daily school environment.

Part II: An X-Ray of the Coded Gaze (Deconstruction and Analysis) – An investigation into data origins and representational biases.

Part III: The Resistance Test (Experimentation) – Practices in fugitive pedagogy designed to test the limits and vulnerabilities of the system.

Part IV: Assembly of Voices (Critical Analysis Podcast) – A collective dialogue regarding the impact of tools on human dignity.

Part V: The JustAI Manifesto (Transformation) – Creation of an interactive digital gallery featuring the class’s ethical guidelines.

Background

This project is grounded in the intersection between the Critical Technological Learning (CTL) model and the work of Stephanie Smith Budhai and Marie Heath, Critical AI in K-12 Classrooms. Its central theoretical foundation draws upon bell hooks’ concept of homeplace, a space of resistance and healing, to argue that technology in schools should not serve merely to enhance efficiency, but rather to affirm students' identities.

Inspired by Joy Buolamwini’s research on the coded gaze, this project challenges the notion that algorithms are objective. While technology companies promote technosolutionism, this manifesto employs Jarvis Givens’ Fugitive Pedagogy to teach students how to bend tools of control, prioritizing human agency and community knowledge. The ultimate goal is to demonstrate that the complexity of a school community, and the vibrant dynamism of learning, cannot be reduced to mere data points or statistical predictions, rather, they must be safeguarded as an act of freedom.

1. Identification Phase (Where is AI?)

According to Budhai and Heath (2026), AI enters schools quietly. Your task begins by naming these tools (login systems, automated graders, recommendation algorithms).

Activity 1: The Archaeology of the Invisible

Objective: To develop sensitivity for detecting AI Creep, the innovative advancement of AI, within the school environment.

The Task: Students act as digital archaeologists. They traverse the school (physically or virtually), identifying where AI is operating unnoticed.

Practical Action: Capture evidence(photos of cameras, screenshots of email text suggestions, captures of recommendation algorithms on the school's YouTube account).

Theoretical Connection: Based on Budhai & Heath (2026), this phase focuses on lifting the veil of technological neutrality.

Final Product: A Surveillance Heatmap, in which students mark their daily points of contact with AI.

2. Deconstruction and Analysis Phase (What does it hide?)

Draw upon Buolamwini’s scholarship to ask:

"Who was included in the training data set?"

"Who is harmed by this design?"

Activity 2: The Coded Gaze Laboratory (Deconstruction and Analysis Phase)

Objective: To investigate the Power Shadows and embedded biases within the identified systems.

The Task: Select one of the pieces of evidence mapped in Activity 1 and perform an ethical dissection.

Practical Action: Research the company's founders, the dataset used for training, and the demographic groups that are frequently marginalized by this tool.

Theoretical Connection: Applies Joy Buolamwini's concept of the Coded Gaze. Students ask: "For whom was this system designed to work, and whom does it fail to see?"

Final Product: An AI X-Ray infographic, revealing the economic interests and hidden biases embedded in the code.

3. Experimentation Phase (How to resist?)

This is where necessary good confusion comes in. Test prompts, use non-standard dialects, and observe how the AI ​​reacts. This is the praxis of Fugitive Pedagogy.

Activity 3: Fugitive Hacking Workshop (Experimentation Phase)

Objective: To practice Fugitive Pedagogy by testing the limits of AI through creative subversion.

The Task: Conduct an Evocative Audit. Students should attempt to trick or provoke the AI to expose its flaws.

Practical Action: Enter prompts that challenge stereotypes, use regional dialects or community slang in language models to see if the AI labels them as incorrect or unprofessional.

Theoretical Connection: Inspired by Jarvis Givens and the practice of Carter G. Woodson, this involves hijacking the tool so that it serves the student’s identity, not conformity.

Final Product: A Resistance Report, documenting how AI fails to capture the richness of human diversity.

4. Transformation Phase (What will we build?)

The final Manifest is your digital homeplace. It defines which tools the class accepts and which it rejects, transforming social justice theory into a concrete policy of use.

Activity 4: The Homeplace Assembly (Transformation Phase)

Objective: To assert agency and create a space of care (Homeplace) through the JustAI Manifesto.

The Task: Consolidate the learnings into a collective governance guide for the school.

Practical Action: The class democratically decides which technologies enhance the vibrancy of learning and which should be boycotted or reformulated for violating human dignity.

Theoretical Connection: Focuses on bell hooks’ concept of Homeplace. Technology should be a site of hope and healing, not of oppression.

Final Product: The JustAI Manifest, published as an interactive website, containing audio, video, and text that outline the community’s rules for the use of AI.