On Wed., May 6, TU held a first-of-a-kind event: AI for Humanity, which examined the human, ethical and governance challenges of artificial intelligence through a live student competition at the StarTUp at the Armory.

Hosted by the College of Liberal Arts and Mind Over Machines, the event featured liberal arts students—not technology specialists—tackling one of today’s biggest unanswered questions: What are the rules for human and AI interaction, and how do we govern AI responsibly while still enabling innovation? 

The event will feature student presenters from a range of liberal arts majors, including anthropology, political science, English, international studies, women’s studies, sociology and psychology. Tim Kulp, CIO of Mind Over Machines, Kelly Schulz, CEO of Maryland Tech Council and Chris Chulos, Dean of the College of Liberal Arts will be in attendance to support students. 

Four interdisciplinary student teams presented governance frameworks addressing a real-world AI use case in pharmaceutical drug discovery, including how AI research agents should interact with regulatory AI systems at the FDA level. Student proposals focused on ethics, guardrails, accountability and AI-to-AI communication. They answered the question: What structures must be in place to ensure that humans maintain control and oversight of AI-AI interactions in that context? 

A panel of leaders in technology, public policy and research evaluated the presentations, with the winning team earning the opportunity to turn their idea into reality through a paid internship with Mind Over Machines. Liam Walker (political science) and Monica Mitchell (international studies) were awarded the top prize. 

This event emphasizes TU as an emerging leader in human-centered AI, demonstrating how humanities and social sciences are critical to building trustworthy, useful systems.