Nelson AI Sandbox: Sharing knowledge, building capability
When expertise is shared, everyone benefits.
Community members connecting, sharing ideas and exploring the possibilities of artificial intelligence at Nelson AI Sandbox.
“AI should free people from tedious tasks, not replace them.”
“I’ve always been an enthusiast for AI,” says Murray. “I could see how it could help small agencies free their minds from tedious work — and make hard-won funding go further. I thought I’d retired, but when Richard Brudvik-Lindner started talking about this vision, I realised my lifetime in IT and our ability to deliver practical workshops could really make a difference. I had to say yes.”
While Richard may be the visionary — “the Pied Piper in this space”, as Murray calls him — Sloane and Murray are focused on making it real for the community.
“We’ve supported over 500 people through the Rātā Foundation workshops alone,” says Sloane. “The most common feedback? ‘I wish I had known about this earlier’ or ‘You’ve just saved me a month’s work in ten minutes.’ That’s when you know it’s working.”
She points to a powerful example of one agency uploading ten years of meeting minutes — with appropriate permissions and care around sensitive information — into an AI tool before a staff transition, enabling their successor to retrieve years of institutional knowledge with a single prompt.
“You’ve just saved me a month’s work in ten minutes.”
“When Richard approached me, I knew my science and tech background, along with my work in community organisations, could really help. The Nelson AI Sandbox’s mission to educate and support others felt like the right place to contribute and to keep learning about how fast AI is changing our world.”
Now it’s about getting a much wider range of people involved, including schools, charities and businesses. For students, that means developing critical thinking about AI and opportunities to practise before they leave school. Everyone will be impacted.
At Nelson AI Sandbox, the philosophy is clear, Sloane says: always keep a human in the loop — Human, AI, Human.