Applications are open for the Better Futures Fellowship, a nine-week, part-time program for people exploring whether better-futures work should become a greater part of their studies, careers, or projects.
Better-futures work asks how humanity can achieve a flourishing long-term future if it successfully navigates advanced AI and other major risks. This application round follows up on the expression of interest shared earlier this summer and draws on research from the Forethought Institute’s Better Futures series.
What Fellows Will Explore
The Fellowship combines five weeks of facilitated discussion with a four-week guided project phase.
Core topics include:
Why improving future flourishing may matter alongside ensuring humanity’s survival
Intelligence explosion and the grand challenges advanced AI could create
What a genuinely good future could look like under moral uncertainty
How AGI could concentrate power and shape long-term outcomes
AI character, epistemics, and choosing where to contribute
During the project phase, each fellow will develop a concrete research or field-building output based on an important question or gap identified during the course.
Who Should Apply
The Fellowship is designed for:
People familiar with effective-altruism principles and cause prioritization who are working in or considering AI safety
People already engaged with AI safety who understand existential risk and transformative AI
Researchers, practitioners, and generalists interested in critically examining how advanced AI could shape humanity’s long-term future
This is not an introductory AI-safety course. Applicants should already have relevant background through previous study, programs, research, or professional experience.
Program Details
Dates: 31 August–1 November 2026
Format: Remote, in groups of approximately four to eight fellows
Discussion phase: Five weeks at approximately five hours per week
Project phase: Four weeks at approximately five to ten hours per week
Applications Open: Better Futures Fellowship Summer 2026
Applications are open for the Better Futures Fellowship, a nine-week, part-time program for people exploring whether better-futures work should become a greater part of their studies, careers, or projects.
Better-futures work asks how humanity can achieve a flourishing long-term future if it successfully navigates advanced AI and other major risks. This application round follows up on the expression of interest shared earlier this summer and draws on research from the Forethought Institute’s Better Futures series.
What Fellows Will Explore
The Fellowship combines five weeks of facilitated discussion with a four-week guided project phase.
Core topics include:
Why improving future flourishing may matter alongside ensuring humanity’s survival
Intelligence explosion and the grand challenges advanced AI could create
What a genuinely good future could look like under moral uncertainty
How AGI could concentrate power and shape long-term outcomes
AI character, epistemics, and choosing where to contribute
During the project phase, each fellow will develop a concrete research or field-building output based on an important question or gap identified during the course.
Who Should Apply
The Fellowship is designed for:
People familiar with effective-altruism principles and cause prioritization who are working in or considering AI safety
People already engaged with AI safety who understand existential risk and transformative AI
Researchers, practitioners, and generalists interested in critically examining how advanced AI could shape humanity’s long-term future
This is not an introductory AI-safety course. Applicants should already have relevant background through previous study, programs, research, or professional experience.
Program Details
Dates: 31 August–1 November 2026
Format: Remote, in groups of approximately four to eight fellows
Discussion phase: Five weeks at approximately five hours per week
Project phase: Four weeks at approximately five to ten hours per week
Cost: Free
Application deadline: 9 August 2026 at 23:59 UTC
Decisions: 17 August
Orientation: Week of 24 August
Apply
Participant application
Facilitator application
Local organizer interest form — reviewed on a rolling basis
Read the original Fellowship announcement for more background.
The Better Futures Fellowship is delivered through AI Safety Collab, a program of ENAIS.
Questions are welcome in the comments or at dennis@aiscollab.org.
AI tools were used to assist with drafting and editing this post.