Impact Academy is a field-building and educational nonprofit that enables talented individuals to pursue careers addressing risks from advanced AI. Founded by Vilhelm Skoglund, Sebastian Schmidt, and Lowe Lundin, the organization runs several programs including the Global AI Safety Fellowship (a fully-funded 3-6 month research placement at leading AI safety labs), an AI Safety Careers Course in India, and a Summer Research Fellowship. Impact Academy has incubated organizations like Axiom Futures for Indian AI safety field-building and partnered with Talos Network on an EU Tech Policy Fellowship.
Impact Academy is a field-building and educational nonprofit that enables talented individuals to pursue careers addressing risks from advanced AI. Founded by Vilhelm Skoglund, Sebastian Schmidt, and Lowe Lundin, the organization runs several programs including the Global AI Safety Fellowship (a fully-funded 3-6 month research placement at leading AI safety labs), an AI Safety Careers Course in India, and a Summer Research Fellowship. Impact Academy has incubated organizations like Axiom Futures for Indian AI safety field-building and partnered with Talos Network on an EU Tech Policy Fellowship.
Funding Details
- Annual Budget
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- Monthly Burn Rate
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- Current Runway
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- Funding Goal
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- Funding Raised to Date
- $2,000,000
- Fiscal Sponsor
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Theory of Change
Impact Academy believes that the safe and beneficial development of AI requires substantially more expert, mission-aligned talent working in AI safety research and governance. Their theory of change centers on identifying exceptional STEM talent globally, particularly from underrepresented regions, and providing them with funded research placements, mentorship, coaching, and training at leading AI safety organizations. By lowering barriers to entry and creating pipelines from education to employment in AI safety, they aim to grow the field of people actively working to reduce catastrophic risks from advanced AI systems. They also build the field indirectly by incubating new AI safety organizations and running introductory courses that expand the base of people engaged with AI safety ideas.
Grants Received
from Survival and Flourishing Fund
Projects
Impact Academy runs fully-funded research fellowships that place exceptional global STEM talent with leading AI safety organizations. Its flagship program, the Global AI Safety Fellowship, supports 10-20 fellows per cohort for 3-6 months at labs such as CHAI, FAR.AI, and the UK AI Safety Institute.
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Discussion
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Key risk: Recent rapid pivot and team turnover create execution and mentorship-quality uncertainty, with a substantial risk of duplicating existing pipelines (e.g., MATS, BlueDot Impact) and limited counterfactual impact if fellows would have entered AI safety via other routes.
Details
- Last Updated
- Apr 2, 2026, 9:48 PM UTC
- Created
- Mar 18, 2026, 11:18 PM UTC
Case for funding: Impact Academy’s Global AI Safety Fellowship channels exceptional STEM talent—especially from underrepresented regions like India—into funded placements with top labs (CHAI, FAR.AI, AISI, Mila), directly addressing the talent bottleneck in AI safety while demonstrating field-building leverage through org incubation and policy programs.