Update: BAI’s NeurIPS Workshop and Travel Grant Program

VIRTUAL – June 30, 2025

Dear Black in AI Community,

We are writing to inform you that Black in AI (“BAI”) has decided to pause its Research Travel Grant program for 2025, and will not be hosting a workshop at the thirty-ninth annual conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (“NeurIPS”) in 2025. This moment offers us an opportunity to reflect on our impact and reimagine how we support our global community of AI practitioners.

For the past eight years, BAI has hosted workshops co-located at NeurIPS and provided travel grants that enabled emerging researchers to attend and present their work at leading AI conferences, including NeurIPS. With the generous support of our corporate sponsors and philanthropic supporters, we’ve enabled more than 600 grantees from over 40 countries to participate in NeurIPS free of charge (via research travel grants). We’ve also hosted 12+ workshops and socials, and distributed more than $2 million in funding to this community of professionals. These grants removed financial barriers that often prevent talented researchers of African descent from participating in global conversations in AI.

Building on this impact, we understand this pause is a major change. As we take stock of these accomplishments, we are also committed to recognizing the evolving needs of our community, the priorities of our supporters, and the state of the research ecosystem more broadly. This pause will allow us to evaluate the long-term impact of our programs and explore new models of support that are scalable and sustainable. We invite feedback from our community at this time to understand what activities would be most valuable in supporting substantial positive long-term impact in the ecosystem and the careers of our professional members. Our goal is to build structures that more effectively equip our members with the resources, mentorship, and infrastructure they need to lead and thrive in the AI field.

This moment of transition does not signal a shift in our mission. Our commitment remains the same. We are focused on broadening the range of voices shaping the development, deployment, and regulation of AI technology. Since our founding, BAI has advocated for the advancement of AI professionals of African descent through several impactful initiatives. These include successfully advocating for the removal of the GRE as a requirement for admission to computer science (CS) programs at more than 20 top-tier institutions, securing over 700 application fee waivers for aspiring graduate students, and supporting more than 900 students through our Emerging Leaders in AI – Graduate Prep program, which was launched in 2018 and reimagined in 2023.

We are excited to enter this next phase of exploration and innovation. We will keep you informed about new opportunities and initiatives as they develop, and we look forward to building the next chapter of BAI together.

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Sincerely,

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Sanmi Koyejo

Board Chair / President

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Gelyn Watkins

CEO

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