TechAccess: AI-Ready America

What is AI-Ready America? 

Informed by America's AI Action Plan, NSF is working to help the nation harness the full potential of AI to bolster the nation's competitive advantage by accelerating AI adoption in every U.S. state and territory. To accomplish this, NSF is working to:

• Enable all Americans to be AI-literate and AI-ready.
• Empower businesses — especially small and emerging businesses — to adopt AI to increase competitiveness, productivity and growth.
• Support local government and organizations in harnessing the power of AI to improve public services and spur local innovation.
• Strengthen workforce capacity to apply and innovate with AI across the education, business and economic sectors, and public services.

In addition, AI-Ready America will identify and address gaps that must be filled to advance AI readiness, develop collaboration networks with community colleges and universities and leverage existing state, tribal and local coordination networks and other resources needed to accelerate adoption.
 

What makes AI-Ready America unique?

AI-Ready America is focused on capacity building through coordination around AI readiness at local, state and national levels to expand access to AI knowledge, tools and resources. To succeed at this, the initiative is designed to reach a broad range of groups, including businesses, public-serving organizations, educational institutions and individuals. 

The AI-Ready America initiative is built around three core activities: state and territory-level coordination hubs, a national coordination lead and AI-Ready Catalyst Award competitions. Learn more about this funding structure.

Collaboration is a cornerstone of the initiative, and NSF is working to foster partnerships across the federal government and private industry to emphasize the importance of working together for an AI-ready America. 

The initiative will ensure stakeholders can effectively apply and innovate with AI by emphasizing practical implementation through hands-on assistance and workforce upskilling and experiential learning through internships and project-based work. 
 

How do I get involved with AI-Ready America?  

NSF TIP seeks partners across industry, philanthropy and the federal government to help strengthen and scale the AI-Ready America initiative, ensuring it can meet the rapidly growing demand for AI-ready talent and infrastructure. TIP welcomes involvement from organizations interested in partnering to advance the mission of AI-Ready America through alignment of mutual goals and support.

To learn more or express interest in partnering with AI-Ready America, please email ai-ready@nsf.gov and include "Partner interest" in the subject line. 
 

AI-Ready America offers three funding pathways. 

• Coordination Hubs: The initiative will be structured around state-level Coordination Hubs — coordinated networks in each U.S. state, territory and the District of Columbia that will connect partners across education, workforce development, industry and government; strengthen planning and deployment; and rapidly scale proven approaches. Using coordination hubs allows state and local agencies to choose what to prioritize in shaping an AI-driven economy that benefits all Americans. The hubs will be expected to provide tools to navigate AI learning opportunities and resources, facilitate hands-on implementation support, coordinate training and capacity building, and support state or territory strategic planning.

  NSF anticipates that each coordination hub awardee will receive $1 million per year for three years, with the possibility of an additional year of support if the coordination hub can demonstrate a compelling need as it phases out or transitions to other sources of funding.  An initial round of funding will support 10 states, with expansion to all states and territories in subsequent rounds. 

  To learn more, read the Coordination Hubs funding opportunity and plan to join two upcoming webinars:

  1. An introduction to the AI-Ready America funding opportunity will take place on Tuesday, April 14, at 1 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time (EDT). Register for the April 14 webinar.
  2. NSF will host a Q&A webinar to answer questions about the AI-Ready America funding opportunity on Thursday, April 23, at 1 p.m. EDT.    Register for the April 23 webinar.

   

• National coordination lead: NSF will award one national coordination lead to work with NSF and other partners to provide overarching coordination for the AI-Ready America initiative. The national coordination lead will facilitate collaboration and knowledge sharing among coordination hubs, coordinate priority economic sectors and inform national AI strategies. NSF anticipates awarding up to $3 million per year in funding for up to five years.
   
• AI-Ready Catalyst Award competitions: AI-Ready Catalyst Award competitions will be targeted competitions designed to address critical gaps identified through stakeholder input and national priorities that rapidly launch new approaches or scale proven models. The awards will focus on a series of topics to pilot and scale innovative approaches that address critical AI readiness needs. NSF anticipates awarding between $5 million and $10 million in funding per competition to a cohort of awardees.
   

Funding opportunities 

Learn more about AI-Ready America by reading the Coordination Hubs funding opportunity.

Stay in touch

Sign up for the TIP email list.

Reports and other related resources 

• AI-Ready America Workshop Report
• America's AI Action Plan
• America's Talent Strategy: Building the Workforce for the Golden Age
• AI Literacy Framework, from the U.S. Department of Labor

Contact us

Email us with your questions at ai-ready@nsf.gov.