17-year-old Mississauga student teaches at MIT with renowned professor

A Mississauga teen assisted in creating and teaching two artificial intelligence courses at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology last month.

The Woodlands Secondary School student, Krishiv Thakuria, 17, worked on the generative AI courses with renowned Professor Manolis Kellis and his team at MIT. Generative AI has the power to create original content by learning patterns from massive datasets.

Krishiv was in the news last year when he was named a top 10 finalist for the Chegg.org Global Student Prize 2025. The award is given to one exceptional student who has made a real impact on learning, their peers, and society at large.

Krishiv said he became interested in AI at 13 years old when his middle school teachers asked him to teach a class of around 30 students with learning disabilities. At 16, he interned in machine learning at BenchSci, one of Canada’s biggest AI companies, and after that, he worked as an AI engineering consultant at Simple Ventures.

He created Aceflow, an AI tutoring platform, and Charm Bears, AI-powered talking teddy bears that help students with dyslexia learn without screens. Krishiv is also a Masason Foundation Scholar and Harvard Ventures Fellow.

As he became more well-known in the AI world, Krishiv began to work with Professor Kellis at MIT CSAIL’s Kellis Lab last May. He became a core AI engineer on the leadership team within three months.

“Because of my work at the lab, he (Kellis) invited me to co-create and instruct MIT 6.S189 (Foundations and Frontiers of Generative AI) during MIT’s Independent Activity Period and be a teaching assistant for MIT Sloan 15.6S5 (Deploying Generative AI in the Corporation),” Krishiv said in an email interview with INsauga.com.

Kellis told INsauga.com that Krishiv excelled in his work.

“Krishiv is extremely eloquent, he’s great, he’s very well-spoken,” Kellis said. “He thinks a lot, he engages the audience, he is very fluid, he is very poised, very clear educationally.”

Kellis tends to choose young people for his team as they adapt to the future much faster.

“I always say, I prefer to a have a team of 17-year-olds coding with the latest frontiers of AI because to them, that’s how it’s always been,'” Kellis said.

His age wasn’t as important as his enthusiasm and talent.

“We are entering a world where drive and talent are far superseding credentials and diplomas,” Kellis said.

Krishiv assisted in teaching the courses between Jan. 5 and 10, and he said they were well received.

“For the MIT Sloan course, which was taken by leaders at IMAX, Wix, Blue Origin, etc., we received overwhelmingly positive feedback thanking us for demystifying generative AI,” he said.

Krishiv Thakuria teaches at MIT. Photo supplied by Krishiv Thakuria

Students commented that the course changed how they see the world, Kellis said.

“People were blown away by the sheer talent of our students who were teaching,” he said.

The MIT Sloan School of Management is the business school of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and some students are industry professionals returning to school for an MBA. Some students were much older than Krishiv.

While there have been younger academics and teaching assistants, Krishiv is “definitely one of the youngest,” Kellis said.

Krishiv worked virtually with Kellis and the team, but travelled to an in-person team retreat in the fall, and went to MIT again to teach in January.

Now in his final year of high school at The Woodlands, Krishiv was able to catch up with his school work when he returned. He will graduate in June and hasn’t settled on a university yet.

“Coming September, I’m hoping to attend a rigorous university program that can build my foundations in both engineering and humanities, so I can continue to build the skills to use technology positively,” he said.

Some people worry that students use AI to cheat in school, but Kellis sees it differently.

“With AI, you can be even more lazy, and if you are driven, with AI, you can be even more accomplished,” he said. “This is one of those examples where you have these extraordinary, talented kids who are able to really make a difference in the world.”