Shaping the Future of AI Governance

Join us for a weekend of collaboration, problem-solving, and networking as you work with like-minded peers to tackle real-world policy challenges related to AI! Located in Washington D.C. or online via Discord. Final deliverables can be either technical demos or policy paper. No coding required and all backgrounds are welcomed!

Why Participate?

• Skill development through hands-on experience in policy-making and AI applications

• Network with industry leaders from OpenAI, Microsoft, and Apart Research, and AI governance scholars

• Receive mentorship from experts in AI and policy

• Present your solutions to tech policy experts & policymakers

• Compete for prizes and recognition

Challenges and Themes

Below are some challenges that participants can work on! We have provided the following tracks, but the participants are welcomed to work on an AI policy-related challenge of their own.

AI Safety:

1. ‍Challenge 1.1: Agentic System Governance‍

   1. Partner: OpenAI‍

   2. Description: Agentic AI systems—AI systems that can pursue complex goals with limited direct supervision— will likely be broadly useful if we can integrate them responsibly into our society. While such systems have substantial potential to help people more efficiently and effectively achieve their own goals, they also create risks of harm. An OpenAI paper discussed this governance issue and implicated a set of open questions. Participants are encouraged to work on a policy paper or a technical demo that addresses these issues.‍

2. Challenge 1.2: How Far Are We from Achieving ASI? Measuring the Progress of AI‍

   1. Partner: OpenAI‍

   2. Description: In the coming decades, AI will enable us to achieve feats that once seemed unimaginable. We are on the cusp of a new era—an "Intelligence Age" (Altman, 2024) —where AI will serve as a foundational tool for human progress, from personalized education and healthcare to groundbreaking scientific discoveries. This challenge invites participants to evaluate how close we reach Artificial Superintelligence (ASI), the next leap in AI’s evolution. Through technical prototypes, research, or theoretical frameworks, explore the key milestones we’ve reached and those still ahead. How can AI continue to amplify human capability and drive unprecedented prosperity?

AI and the Future of Work:

1. ‍Partner: OpenAI

2. ‍Description: As AI continues to transform industries, the nature of work is evolving at an unprecedented pace. In the near future, AI systems will serve as collaborative assistants, helping us solve complex problems and automating routine tasks. This challenge invites participants to explore the future of work in the AI era. How will AI reshape labor markets, create new roles, or redefine existing ones? Participants can develop policy frameworks, design AI-driven tools for workplace efficiency, or propose strategies to ensure AI enhances human potential while addressing shifts in job structures. The goal is to envision a future where AI and human collaboration lead to shared prosperity.

AI and Public Health:

Challenge Overview

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the critical importance of rapid, data-driven decision-making in public health emergencies. AI and machine learning have immense potential to support real-time disease monitoring, early warning systems, resource allocation, and policy interventions. For this hackathon challenge, we’re asking teams to develop AI-powered solutions to enhance public health preparedness and emergency response capabilities. Your task is to identify a specific public health challenge and create an AI-driven tool or system that can help address it.

The Challenge:

Choose one of the following public health focus areas and develop an innovative AI-powered solution:

1. Disease Surveillance and Early Warning: Create an AI system that can rapidly detect, track, and predict the spread of infectious diseases using diverse data sources (e.g., electronic health records, social media, transportation patterns).

2. Resource Allocation and Logistics: Develop an AI-powered decision support tool to optimize the distribution of medical supplies, hospital beds, and other critical resources during public health emergencies.

3. Personalized Public Health Interventions: Design an AI platform to deliver customized health recommendations, nudges, and interventions to individuals based on their unique risk factors and behaviors.

4. Health Equity and Vulnerable Populations: Build an AI system that can identify and address disparities in health outcomes, access to care, and social determinants of health for marginalized communities.

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AI & Sustainability

Challenge Overview:

Create an innovative solution that leverages AI to address a specific environmental sustainability challenge. Solutions can be either technical demonstrations (prototype/proof of concept) or policy proposals.

Challenge Statement:

Choose one of these sustainability challenges and propose either a technical or policy solution:

1. Urban Energy Optimization

   • Reduce energy waste in buildings

   • Optimize public transportation

   • Smart grid management

2. Waste Reduction

   • Improve recycling efficiency

   • Reduce food waste

   • Optimize supply chains

3. Climate Impact Monitoring

   • Track carbon emissions

   • Monitor deforestation

   • Predict environmental risks

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AI & Law:

1. ‍Partner: Center for Language and Speech Processing, Johns Hopkins University (PI: Benjamin Van Durme)

2. ‍Description: Participants in this challenge will have access to CLERC, a massive US case law dataset, offering a rich resource for exploring legal discovery through AI. You can tackle existing tasks such as legal case retrieval, automate legal analysis generation, or develop innovative ideas and novel tasks based on this dataset. Whether improving retrieval accuracy or enhancing AI-driven legal reasoning, this challenge provides the opportunity to shape the future of legal tech by leveraging advanced machine learning on one of the largest legal corpora available.

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Prize Pool: $3,000

Outstanding Solutions (3 teams)

• $500 per team ($1,500 total)

• Opportunity to present to policymakers and industry leaders

• Recognition at award ceremony

Spotlight Awards (5 teams)

• $200 per team ($1,000 total)

• Recognition from expert judges

• Networking with AI policy professionals

Special Awards

• Best Innovation Award: $250

• Diversity & Inclusion Award: $250

  • Independent award that can be won alongside other prizes

  • Recognizes teams promoting diverse perspectives in AI policy