Call for Proposals for Seed Grant Funding—UChicago AI Initiative: Teaching and Learning

Submission Deadline – April 30, 2025

Award Notifications – May 15, 2025

Aims

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has significantly transformed forms of knowledge production, and it has also sparked great changes in the context in which teaching and learning takes place in institutions of higher education. In recent years, leadership at the University of Chicago has made a commitment to advancing AI in both research and education. This seed grant, funded by the university’s Artificial Intelligence Education Working Group (AIEWG), is designed to support faculty and instructors who are interested in exploring the pedagogical promise and parameters of AI. Indeed, no matter how much we may (or may not) directly engage AI in our courses, we are all teaching in the AI landscape.

We invite proposals from instructors and faculty from across the university who are interested in the relationship of AI to teaching and learning. We imagine these proposals as covering a broad spectrum. Some may seek to broadly embrace AI and its use for supporting learning, administration, and assessment. Others may be looking to explore approaches to course design and assignments that limit the use of AI. Specific grants could be used, for example: to assess student use of AI; to adopt and test new AI programs and AI agents or bots; to expand and/or assess existing AI efforts related to teaching and learning; to set up trainings or workshops fostering AI literacy for instructors and faculty; to hire a student to build out an AI module for a course; to invite an outside expert to give a discipline-focused talk on AI and pedagogy; or to convene a committee to establish guidelines or policies around AI.

Grants will be made available for up to $10,000. Faculty, instructors must serve as the PI, but we welcome applications from teams that also include staff and students.

Objectives

1. To support innovative projects at UChicago that respond to teaching in the AI landscape.
2. To support student learning in the AI landscape at UChicago.
3. To enhance faculty and instructor capacity to use AI tools and technologies in their instructional practices.
4. To support the development of ethical and useful polices and norms around AI in courses, programs, and Core sequences
5. To foster a culture of pedagogical innovation and experimentation in education at UChicago.

Important Dates

• Accepting Applications: April 1, 2025 - April 30, 2025
• Announcement of Funding and Allocation: May 15, 2025
• Awardees will be invited to give a short final report and brief presentation at a Colloquium in the Spring Quarter, 2026

Submission Guidelines

• 1-2 page narrative + budget

Note:

• Faculty salary or contributions may not be funded.
• Expert support from ATS, the Library, and the CCTL will be provided as needed

Submission Instructions

Please submit application here by April 30th.

The selection committee, which is made up of members of the AIEWG, will consider the following criteria:

• Feasibility of project
• Potential for positive and broad impact on learners or instructors (or both).
• Potential for reusability and sustainability.
• Creativity and innovation of approach, method, or design.

Contacts

AI Education Working Group Coordinator (AIEWG): Anna Szabo, anna.szabo@uchicago.edu

Seed Grant Chair: Robin Paige, ED of CCTL, rpaige1@uchicago.edu

AIEWG Faculty Chair: Emily Lynn Osborn, eosborn1@uchicago.edu