Help build the pipeline for nontechnical talent by creating a course to help BlueDot graduates build enough context to take next steps.
About the project
AI safety needs more generalists: founders, fieldbuilders, ops staff, comms staff, and more. All of these kinds of work require a deep understanding of the AI safety landscape, much more than you get from a BlueDot course or two. At Kairos, we find candidates with that level of understanding are vanishingly rare, making generalist roles extremely difficult to hire for. That's because, for those without access to university groups, there's no obvious way to build context after you finish BlueDot. Myriads of talented nontechnical people around the globe encounter AI safety, do BlueDot, and then stagnate in frustration as role after role rejects them for lack of context - while orgs fail to fill roles that could have used their professional skills. How do we bridge that gap?
In this project, mentees will build and launch a course intended to follow BlueDot's AGI Strategy course, aimed at highly motivated nontechnical talent. While the course's format will likely change (with your input!) as we continue to scope it, it will aim to maximize substantive engagement with AI safety ideas and will likely focus more on discussion, debate, and writing than on readings. We'll also attempt to recreate the warm social connections that make university groups so effective. Graduates of the course should feel deeply connected to AI safety and understand the ideas deeply enough to take on small substantive projects in the field, with the ultimate goal of bootstrapping to the SPAR generalist stream, then Generator, then AIS careers.
Theory of change
While the technical and policy pipelines have well-built-out progressions of courses to fellowships to roles, the generalist pipeline is only just beginning to create this infrastructure. Help replicate what's worked well in other fields to give jobseekers the skills hiring orgs are looking for.
Your role
Mentees will:
- Help strategically scope and guide the project
- Create course content: decide what topics to focus on, find the best readings on them, come up with writing and discussion prompts, and plan the course's overall format
- Launch and run an application cycle
- (Likely in the extension period) Teach the pilot cohort of the course
My goal is for mentees to finish the project with strong, well-informed fieldbuilding takes, more general AIS knowledge, improved teaching/facilitation skills and people understanding, and practice keeping projects pointed at their strategic goals.
Prerequisites
- High context on AI safety; in particular, spends a lot of time on the Forum/LW/etc
- Strong people skills
- Conscientious and organized
- Strong preference for candidates with fieldbuilding experience (e.g. uni group organizing)
- Preference for candidates who have run a BlueDot course or intro fellowship before
Location preference
None
Application question(s)
- What experience do you have with AI safety fieldbuilding?
- Link one article you'd suggest course participants read and discuss, along with a discussion prompt meant to promote deep thinking.
- How would you design this course to help participants bond with each other? What are the main challenges in this, and what are the key ingredients to make it work?
About the mentor
Hello! I'm a generalist at Kairos, working on everything from program management to recruiting to legal review. Before Kairos, I did backend operations at METR and Coefficient Giving, and before that I was heavily involved in local fieldbuilding. I've been involved in AI safety since the ancient days of 2019 or so. I'm excited to help mentees build context on AI safety and develop more strategic career and project plans.