Launching the MIT AI Exchange
Dear members of the MIT community,
With all its unfolding opportunities and inherent risks, AI is now an evolving fact of life – everywhere and certainly at MIT. The societal implications and ethical challenges are immense and demand our concerted attention. Simultaneously, we need to adapt to AI constructively in our own community: making the most of its ability to accelerate research and offer new pedagogical approaches that enhance our human-centered teaching and learning.
As MIT’s recent report on AI and education made clear, for members of our community to thrive in a world where AI touches nearly everything, the Institute needs to provide tools, training, support and coordination for those who wish to engage with them.
This letter sketches our emerging plans to do that through a framework called the MIT AI Exchange. Developed in concert with the deans and many staff and faculty colleagues, the MIT AI Exchange is designed to serve everyone at MIT directly involved with teaching, learning and research. It will provide a centralized way to access resources and will convene people from across MIT to share best practices and to learn and experiment together.
In parallel, given the potential of AI to streamline administrative processes, we’re developing equivalent resources to serve everyone here involved in administration; details to come.
The MIT AI Exchange
The MIT AI Exchange will consist of the Learning Exchange, the Research Exchange and shared infrastructure and resources. It will be overseen jointly by Chancellor Melissa Nobles, who will focus on learning, and Provost Anantha Chandrakasan, who will focus on research.
Structured to be helpful whatever the degree of your experience with or interest in AI, the Learning and Research Exchanges will help members of our community engage critically and creatively with AI to advance teaching, learning, research and discovery. Both exchanges will actively advance the ethical and responsible use of AI in ways broadly beneficial to society, with an emphasis on augmenting rather than replacing human judgment, creativity and expertise.
Importantly, the Exchanges, in partnership with the schools and the college, will bring together and provide resources for “communities of practice.” Some will be discipline-specific, some cross-disciplinary. They will all provide ways for peers to compare their experiences; share new ideas, insights and practices; build new tools; and create shared data sets. In addition, both the Learning and Research Exchanges will offer:
- Training workshops, seminars and guidance
- Seed grants to test new approaches
- Discipline-specific guidance
More details on the three parts of the MIT AI Exchange are below.
The Learning Exchange
Co-directed by Professors Eric Klopfer and Sam Madden, the Learning Exchange will, in the words of the AI and education report, help “deepen our scientific understanding of how AI affects learning and make sure our educational practices reflect that evolving knowledge.” It will also actively convene and support faculty, staff and students who are working to strengthen MIT’s in-person, human-centered residential education and tend to our students’ personal growth and flourishing.
The Research Exchange
Led by Professor Markus Buehler, the Research Exchange will help researchers across disciplines pursue frontier methods and opportunities made possible by advances in AI and will foster the development of shared tools, data and research capabilities.
It will also include several efforts, led by all the schools and the college, that will bring together experts from across the Institute organized around the intersection of AI and a number of large thematic areas. These initial “AI + X” focus areas will be science, engineering, management and society. The deans will share more information on these efforts in the coming weeks.
Shared infrastructure and resources
Both the Learning and Research Exchanges will offer the benefits of shared infrastructure and resources, such as compute access; physical infrastructure, including staffed computing spaces; content experts, including UROPs and a help desk; and institutional support.
Coordination and oversight
Because the MIT AI Exchange itself has many moving parts, and because there is already an extraordinary array of related work going on across campus, it will be aided by a coordinating council composed of the three faculty leads and other members appointed by the faculty chair and the deans of the schools and college.
How can you learn more or seek assistance?
The preliminary MIT AI Exchange website currently offers links to guidance and resources. It will soon provide ways to request direct assistance and connect with others; as the Exchange itself develops, the website will grow more useful too. You can reach the leadership teams directly by writing to learningexchange@mit.edu or researchexchange@mit.edu, according to your interest.
We also encourage instructors to attend one of the upcoming forums on AI and education, hosted by Faculty Chair Roger Levy:
Wednesday, October 14, 3:30 to 5:00 p.m. (Today)
In-person in 10-250 and on Zoom
Tuesday, November 17, 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. (Newly added)
In-person in 10-250 and on Zoom
Wednesday, December 2, 3:30 to 5:00 p.m.
In-person in 10-250 and on Zoom
Next steps – with all deliberate speed
These are early days. We will be sharing additional details in the weeks to come. But as the AI and education report put it plainly, “there is a lot to do” – and no time to waste. We are grateful to Eric, Sam and Markus for jumping in to lead this vital effort with such focus, creativity, energy and skill.
Sincerely,
Sally Kornbluth
President
Anantha Chandrakasan
Provost
Melissa Nobles
Chancellor