California, NVIDIA launch first of its kind AI collaboration

News

Aug 9, 2024

What you need to know: New state initiative with NVIDIA kick-starts efforts to expand artificial intelligence (AI) tools and resources so students, educators, and workers - especially in community colleges - can learn new skills and advance their careers.

SANTA CLARA - California is partnering with NVIDIA on a new initiative to collaborate on cutting-edge AI efforts and provide our students, educators, and workers with unprecedented access to this transformative technology.

The initiative, signed by Governor Gavin Newsom and NVIDIA founder & CEO Jensen Huang, aims to:

1. Train students, educators and workers
2. Support job creation and promote innovation
3. Use AI to solve challenges that can improve the lives of Californians

Among other goals, it strives to bring new AI resources into community colleges from NVIDIA - including curriculum and certifications, hardware and software, AI labs and workshops, and more - to open new pathways for students, educators and workers to learn new skills and advance their careers.

California's world-leading companies are pioneering AI breakthroughs, and it's essential that we create more opportunities for Californians to get the skills to utilize this technology and advance their careers. We're teaming up with NVIDIA to connect AI tools directly to students, educators, and workers - creating a pipeline to drive the innovations of the future.

Governor Gavin Newsom

This initiative builds off of Governor Newsom's executive order, which called for the state to utilize AI to best serve Californians. Just this year, the state unveiled a state worker training program, held a GenAI summit, issued a GenAI toolkit for state procurement, launched pilot projects to explore how GenAI could help address challenges like traffic congestion and language accessibility, and more.

We're in the early stages of a new industrial revolution that will transform trillion-dollar industries around the world. Together with California, NVIDIA will train 100,000 students, college faculty, developers, and data scientists to harness this technology to prepare California for tomorrow's challenges and unlock prosperity throughout the state.

NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang

The Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) lays out a series of key objectives:

Harness AI to grow the economy & create jobs

• NVIDIA aims to provide technical guidance, mentorship, and access to advanced AI hardware and software resources to support cutting-edge research initiatives.
• California will explore opportunities to support early-stage AI startups and public-private partnerships to create AI innovation zones and job creation hubs.
• NVIDIA strives to explore hackathons or design sprints that showcase practical applications of AI in California.

Training for students, educators, and workers

• California and NVIDIA plan to collaborate on creating AI laboratories in higher education facilities that can be equipped to meet the evolving needs of AI education and research.
• California will fund AI worker training initiatives across educational institutions and industries and work with NVIDIA to develop faculty programs to improve AI literacy and curriculum.
• NVIDIA aims to create pipelines and learning paths for AI talent and industry-recognized certifications for AI in specific sectors, including train-the-trainer programs for faculty.
• California will adopt skills and training for state careers, including new roles for AI specialists in government.

Promote statewide innovation, real-world applications

• NVIDIA and California will support initiatives to use AI technologies to address local challenges, including opportunities for students to work on real-world AI projects.
• NVIDIA to help enable access to cutting-edge AI hardware, software, and cloud computing resources for educational and research initiatives.

Direct collaboration with Community College system

• Integrate AI concepts into curriculum for students to learn how to use AI applications to help them get jobs in high-demand sectors.
• Organize AI workshops and bootcamps relevant to in-demand local jobs and collaborate with regional employers to build up an in-demand skilled workforce.
• Identify faculty for AI ambassador programs and faculty development programs, expand AI certificate programs across colleges to meet local employer needs.

"This partnership will help the California Community Colleges and its more than 2 million students prepared with industry aligned skills in AI and ready on day one for careers that will drive their prosperity and our state's economic competitiveness. We can't stand still as AI changes the future of learning, and our approach prioritizes equitable access to AI teaching and learning enhancements that will lift up underserved populations."- Sonya Christian, Chancellor of California Community Colleges

Following today's announcement, California is issuing a call to action encouraging other AI and tech stakeholders to join future partnerships to ensure California continues to be a global leader in education, innovation, research, and preparing the workforce of the future and today. California's world-class University of California and California State University systems will also partner with the state on these efforts in the future.

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