Inside UPenn's new Artificial Intelligence degree program debuting fall 2024
UNIVERSITY CITY - Students at the University of Pennsylvania will soon be able to earn a degree in artificial intelligence.
They are the first Ivy League school to offer the new major through their School of Engineering.
"We have been slowly building AI into a lot of our curriculum, so most of the courses that we’re teaching are already in existence," said Robert Ghrist, Undergraduate Dean of Penn Engineering.
In a news release, the university said, "The rapid rise of generative AI is transforming virtually every aspect of life: health, energy, transportation, robotics, computer vision, commerce, learning, and even national security. This produces an urgent need for innovative, leading-edge AI engineers who understand the principles of AI and how to apply them in a responsible and ethical way."
Students will eventually be able to build out concentrations, including the use of AI in robotics, but they will start with core math and computer classes, and a class on the ethics of AI.
UPenn becomes first Ivy League school to offer Artificial Intelligence degree
The Ivy League is taking a step into the future thanks to a new degree being offered by the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
The AI technology has made headlines for its use in scams and algorithms with harmful biases.
"The philosophy of the class is that as scientists and engineers, we built these models and systems in the first place. If there’s things we can identify about their behavior that we’re unhappy with, we could try at least to go back to the drawing board and fix those problems as well," said Michael Kearns, a professor in the School of Engineering.
FOX 29 was there as students showed a robot walking on a ball, with only the guidance of a leash. Using methods like ChatGPT, a chatbot, students provide guidance to robots on how to learn complex skills.
"We trained this in simulation for about a day," said Yecheng Jason Ma, a fourth-year PhD student at Penn.
"They demonstrate a level of dexterity that robots have not had up until now," said Dinesh Jayaraman, an Assistant Professor. " What we’re hoping and we’re already able to show, to some extent, not just this one skill, but that same basic algorithm can be used by this robot to use many diverse skills."
When asked about the fear around the technology replacing jobs and general anxiety about using robots in society, Ghrist says it’s important to remember how far we’ve come.
"On the whole would I rather have e-mail and put up with spam, or would I get rid of it altogether? I think I really value my e-mail, I really value my internet, even though there are internet scams out there," he said "AI has that same potential."
The new program will begin in fall 2024 with applications for existing students who would like to transfer. Fall 2025 applications for all prospective students will be made available in fall 2024.