Carnegie Mellon University’s leadership in AI and learning science is reflected in a wide range of initiatives spanning early learning, K-12 education, community college and postsecondary education and workforce development. 

“Our goal is to make student and faculty success the norm, not the exception," said Norman Bier, executive director of the Simon Initiative, Open Learning Initiative and Learnvia. "Decades of research show that combining great teaching, effective courseware, and continuous learning research leads to meaningful improvements in student outcomes.” 

Below are a few examples of efforts underway at CMU to transform learning science.

• CS Academy(opens in new window) provides a free computer science curriculum to more than 500,000 students and 6,000 teachers in all 50 states.
• Robotics Academy(opens in new window) utilizes research-based educational robots and engages nearly three million K-12 students annually in pathways to computer science and STEM.
• picoCTF(opens in new window) is the nation's largest high school hacking competition, gamifying cybersecurity education for more than 600,000 active users.
• AI4K12 State AI Curricula(opens in new window) establishes national AI education guidelines, including the use of VEX robots for prompt engineering.
• Personalized Learning Squared (PLUS)(opens in new window), a hybrid human-AI tutoring program with Carnegie Learning and Stanford, has served nearly 5,000 middle school students in math.
• AI Scholars(opens in new window) provides a free, four-week immersive AI experience for rising high school seniors on CMU’s campus.
• The Leonard Gelfand Center for Service Learning and Outreach(opens in new window) develops and strengthens university-community partnerships with a focus on K-12 STEM programs.
• Summer Academy for Math and Science(opens in new window) (SAMS) provides opportunities for underrepresented students in STEM-related fields.
• Leadership, Excellence, Access, Persistence(opens in new window) (LEAP) is an educational program that uses storytelling to empower under-resourced high school students to become agents of social change.

• Learnvia(opens in new window), a new nonprofit learning collaborative developed in collaboration with the Gates Foundation, combines free, AI-enabled courseware, evidence-based instruction and the power of learning research to strengthen student success and course outcomes at colleges and universities nationwide.
• Sail() Platform(opens in new window) (Social and Interactive Learning) partners with more than 30 U.S. community colleges to rapidly deliver project-based curricula in high-demand areas like cloud computing and data science, with real-time adaptive instruction.
• Open Learning Initiative (opens in new window)applies learning science and continuous feedback to open, research-backed courses used by hundreds of institutions worldwide — driving dramatically higher learning gains, including six times the improvement in half the time compared to traditional instruction
• REAL CHEM(opens in new window), collaboratively designed by CMU and Arizona State University researchers and developers, integrates authentic, data-driven contexts into core chemistry concepts, enabling students to connect abstract principles to how chemistry shapes their lives and careers. 

• AI Technician Training(opens in new window) is an 18-month certificate program in collaboration with the Army AI Integration Center, with more than 100 soldiers completing the training.
• Master’s of Educational Technology and Applied Learning Science (opens in new window)(METALS), a one-year, interdisciplinary master’s program, trains graduate students to become learning engineers.
• U.S. Army Data Driven Leadership Certificate Program(opens in new window) has equipped more than 1,300 Army senior leaders with the knowledge, tools and frameworks to lead confidently in a data-centric environment.
• Robotic Warfare Specialist Training(opens in new window), a seven-week intensive course designed to help U.S. Navy sailors prepare for AI-enabled systems.
• Carnegie Mellon Robotics Academy’s SMART Robotics Technician program(opens in new window) offers 200 hours of hands-on learning for aspiring technicians in smart manufacturing and advanced robotics.
• A variety of online graduate certificates in fields like AI Engineering Fundamentals(opens in new window) and Gen AI & Large Language Models(opens in new window) allow professionals to upskill.
• CMU’s specialized master’s programs offer accelerated 9-month (e.g., Applied Data Science(opens in new window)) and 12-month (e.g., Machine Learning, AI(opens in new window)) programs for upskilling and reskilling talent in high-need areas.