MIT announced a $1 billion plan to create a new college for AI. Namely, MIT will create a new college that includes AI, machine learning, and data science with other academic disciplines. It would be considered as the largest financial investment in AI by any US academic institution to date.
Headquartered in a new building on MIT’s campus, the new MIT Schwarzman College of Computing will be a hub for work in computer science, AI, data science, and related fields. The College will:
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- Reorient MIT to bring the power of computing and AI to all fields of study at MIT, allowing the future of computing and AI to be shaped by insights from all other disciplines;
- Create 50 new faculty positions that will be located both within the College and jointly with other departments across MIT — nearly doubling MIT’s academic capability in computing and AI;
- Give MIT’s five schools a shared structure for collaborative education, research, and innovation in computing and AI;
- Educate students in every discipline to responsibly use and develop AI and computing technologies to help make a better world; and
- Transform education and research in public policy and ethical considerations relevant to computing and AI.
MIT President L. Rafael Reif, noted:
The MIT Schwarzman College of Computing will constitute both a global center for computing research and education, and an intellectual foundry for powerful new AI tools. Just as important, the College will equip students and researchers in any discipline to use computing and AI to advance their disciplines and vice-versa, as well as to think critically about the human impact of their work
The MIT Schwarzman College of Computing aspires not only to be a center of advances in computing, but also a place for teaching and research on relevant policy and ethics to ensure that the groundbreaking technologies of the future are responsibly implemented in support of the greater good. To advance these priorities, the College will:
- Develop new curricula that will connect computer science and AI with other disciplines;
- Host forums to engage national leaders from business, government, academia, and journalism to examine the anticipated outcomes of advances in AI and machine learning, and to shape policies around the ethics of AI;
- Encourage scientists, engineers, and social scientists to collaborate on analysis of emerging technology, and on research that will serve industry, policymakers, and the broader research community; and
- Offer selective undergraduate research opportunities, graduate fellowships in ethics and AI, a seed-grant program for faculty, and a fellowship program to attract distinguished individuals from other universities, government, industry, and journalism.
