November 13–15, 2026, in the Finger Lakes. Sixteen graduate students and researchers from universities across Central and Western New York. Admission is by application, and participation is fully funded.
The retreat runs from Friday evening to Sunday afternoon, with all participants staying on site. Three days is enough time to read the same material, work through the disagreements it produces, and form working relationships that hold afterwards. The cohort is capped at sixteen so that everyone takes part in every session.
Location. The retreat is held at a lake house in the Finger Lakes, about an hour to an hour and a half from Rochester and close to Cornell and Ithaca. The exact address is shared with accepted participants.
Lodging, meals, and travel within the region are covered by a grant. There is no cost to participants or to their departments.
Both strands run through the full programme. Participants attend every session.
The institutional, political, and social dimensions of risk from advanced AI, and the mechanisms by which societies might reduce catastrophic outcomes.
The methods and experiments researchers use to understand and constrain the behaviour of current systems.
Graduate students, researchers, and advanced undergraduates at institutions in Central and Western New York — in computer science, policy, philosophy, the life sciences, law, or adjacent fields. No prior background in AI safety is required. A substantial number of participants will be engaging with this material properly for the first time.
We select for sustained interest. The application takes approximately fifteen minutes. Applications close Friday, 16 October.
The retreat is the start of a longer programme: local meetings, reading groups, and a larger regional event in the spring. Most of this is organised in our Slack workspace, alongside people from every campus in the network.
The Slack workspace is open to anyone in Central or Western New York with an interest in the subject.
Applications close Friday, 16 October and take about fifteen minutes. Every application is read, and every applicant receives a decision; accepted participants receive the exact address and full details.