Netflix Inc (NASDAQ: NFLX) (ETR: NFC) Executive Chairman and co-founder Reed Hastings is donating millions to Bowdoin College for artificial intelligence research. He obtained his Bachelor of Arts degree there in 1983, majoring in math.
The Maine-based school announced the Hastings Initiative for AI and Humanity on Monday. A U$50-million-dollar gift from him making it possible is the largest donation the institution has received in over 230 years.
The primary aims of the undertaking are vague, but what is known is that it will focus on ethical AI development while supporting integration of the technology into teaching modalities. Ten new faculty members will be hired to support the initiative.
“This donation seeks to advance Bowdoin’s mission of cultivating wisdom for the common good by deepening the college’s engagement with one of humanity’s most transformative developments: artificial intelligence,” Hastings said in the announcement.
This is not the first time he has taken an interest in AI. It was a specialization for him when he obtained his Master’s Degree in computer science from Stanford University in the late 1980s. Now, the Netflix founder says that it will help his streaming service be more productive.
“AI will help us be more creative,” Hastings said in an interview at Stanford’s business school last year. “We will be able to produce more shows using those tools.”
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Bowdoin is well-versed with AI research
Artificial intelligence is not uncharted territory for the private liberal arts college.
Last fall, the school hosted a symposium on the role of AI in music creation titled “Klavierfest: The Sound of Innovation.”
It’s not the first funding contribution the institution has received for machine learning studies either. In late September, Bowdoin secured a a grant worth nearly a quarter million US dollars to help integrate AI into the curriculum. It was provided by the Davis Educational Foundation, based in Maine’s town of Yarmouth.
“We need to get to a place where we can harness these kinds of tools effectively and responsibly and also teach our students to do the same,” professor Eric Chown said at the time.
And in 2022, Bowdoin was one of the schools selected for a nationwide AI ethics initiative sponsored by Google.
rowan@mugglehead.com
