The new thing on campus. Why universities call their first chief officers of AI

“My first reaction was: ‘No, I don’t like the word officer,’“Shehu remembers.” I am a faculty, I am a researcher, I am an educator. What is this officer thing?”

But she was finally convinced to ignore the doubts of the title and rather focus on the important work to come. Universities like George Mason recognize that the appointment of a CAIO is essential to coordinate how the tools will modify workflows for teachers and staff; Promote research and partnerships with AI companies; And develop a study strategy for a student body that must acquire AI skills if they want to compete in a particularly difficult labor market for entry -level workers.

After all, universities played a vital role in the creation of many the largest and most precious technological companies in America. Mark Zuckerberg and his college roommates founded Facebook at Harvard University, while Michael Dell’s first days of trade started at the University of Texas, and Google began as a research project by PHD students from Stanford University, Larry Page and Sergey Brin.

“We are thinking of means of ensuring that each graduate of the university has a certain literacy of AI,” explains Shehu, who became Caio de George Mason in September. “Universities create technologies.”

During the last year, the major universities ranging from the UCLA to the University of Maryland have appointed inaugural Caios, reflecting a trend in the private sector and the government while large institutions see the value of better coordinating their AI efforts with a centralized post at C. Boston Consulting Group says that it recommend this approach, because an AI strategy must be vast beyond within the IT department.

“Whether you choose to identify this as an additional duty for an individual who is already seated inside the C-Suite, or that you bring someone again to meet this challenge, he must be empowered to resolve this kind of cross challenges that arise with the deployment of artificial intelligence”, explains Noah Broestl, partner and associate director of the AI ​​responsible for BCG.

When the UCLA named Chris Mattmann as the main data and an IA officer a year ago, the university announced the role of first of its kind to all campuses of the University of California and Mattmann as one of the few in this role in an American school. Previously, Mattmann had a long career in the government, including a 24 -year term in the NASA jet propulsion laboratory. He was also an advisor for the executive decree of the Biden administration in 2023 on the AI ​​which underlined the need for Caios in the government.

Mattmann was not sure if his work at the UCLA would be more aligned with the government, which tends to be more focused on politicians, or that of a real technologist. So far, it was a mixture of the two. On the policy side, it establishes standards for large -language models on data, has evaluated the risks of use of AI and led an AI inventory initiative on a campus scale to follow the two standard AI tools on the campus and the AI ​​developed and personalized by the researchers.

The UCLA has also forged a partnership with OPENAI, making the chatbot chatgpt widely available through the campus and launching a program of project proposals with the hyperscaler of the AI ​​which was open to all teachers, students and researchers. Nearly 100 projects have been submitted, aligned from the Faculty of Medicine to the Music Department.

“We take these projects, then we bring them to governance and say:” Okay, which will move forward and which have the support of their schools and their deans, “explains Mattmann. “And then,” which should we turn off? ” So these are the conversations we have. »»

At the University of Utah, Manish Parashar became his inaugural Caio in February, after having helped direct the investment of $ 100 million from the school to promote research on AI, attract talent, build infrastructure and create a consortium to work with other university institutions.

Parashar works in close collaboration with Microsoft and Openai on the vision of the school for AI and actively meets others, notably Google, Nvidia and IBM. Although it plays a strategic role in determining AI policies and communications on the appropriate use of AI across the campus, Parashar says that it does not want to control each decision.

“Teaching in a class of human sciences is very different from a computer class, which is very different from a business class,” explains Parashar. “It is very difficult to centralize, but you want to have coherent practices that are aligned with university policies.”

Anupam Joshi had been CAIO for less than a month at the University of Maryland, in the county of Baltimore, when he spoke to Fortune. He shared that the leadership of the school had realized that AI had generated excitement beyond the typical fields of computer science and information sciences.

Another motivation factor was the need. Maryland’s budgetary problems were exacerbated by the Trump administration discounts, which had a disproportionate impact on the major federal state labor. The role of CAIO, says Joshi, “will evolve according to the fact that the state is looking for efficiency gains.”

While he moves into his new work, Joshi says he explores research partnerships that can be extended with companies like Google and Microsoft, while listening to the way teachers want to use and teach AI. Many university professors already use AI in their work, sometimes to the dismay of the students they teach. Joshi says that teachers also tend to be a vocal crowd that does not hesitate to share their learned opinions.

“I think that one who enters these kinds of roles must start with the position of humility,” explains Joshi. “Because it is one thing to do your own research in AI, to try to push the state of art, and that is another thing to use it as a tool to transform businesses.”

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