David Reed

Dr. David Reed is the Associate Provost for Strategic Initiatives at the University of Florida. He has been a driving force in the university’s AI Initiative, which began when the University was gifted academia’s fastest AI supercomputer worth over $65M. Reed has led the university’s effort to expand AI throughout the university, including creating and overseeing a dozen AI working groups. UF’s goal is to provide AI education to any student, regardless of their major or previous exposure to computer programming. UF also created a university-wide undergraduate certificate in AI so that students across the university can layer AI education on top of their current major. This dramatically increases the number of students getting AI experience, as well as the breadth of disciplines in which they are being trained. Reed established and currently leads the Artificial Intelligence Academic Initiative Center (AI² Center), which supports the training of AI faculty, new AI course development, and student engagement in AI. The AI² Center also oversees a five-year, multi-million-dollar project to expand AI offerings at the University of Florida. UF’s model of teaching AI to everyone is called “AI Across the Curriculum.” Reed and the AI² Center are taking this innovative model of AI education to K-12 districts, community and state colleges, other universities, and to existing workers through professional development courses. UF sees this broad model as the only model that can scale to meet the AI workforce needs of the nation. Before leading the AI Initiative, Reed was a National Science Foundation-funded scientist studying genomics.