NSF Seeks Public Comment on Development of a National AI Action Plan

The National Science Foundation has issued a request for public comment to help define priorities for a new Artificial Intelligence Action Plan. The plan, directed by Presidential Executive Order 14179 on Jan. 23, will "define the priority policy actions needed to sustain and enhance America's AI dominance, and to ensure that unnecessarily burdensome requirements do not hamper private sector AI innovation."

Development of the plan will be led by the Assistant to the President for Science and Technology (Office of Science and Technology Policy), the White House AI and Crypto Czar, and the National Security Advisor. Executive Order 14179 follow's President Trump's Jan. 20 revocation of the Biden-Harris AI Executive Order "Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence," which, according to the NSF notice, "hampered the private sector's ability to innovate in AI by imposing burdensome government requirements restricting private sector AI development and deployment."

The NSF is encouraging the public to suggest "concrete AI policy actions" to address any relevant AI topics, such as: "hardware and chips, data centers, energy consumption and efficiency, model development, open source development, application and use (either in the private sector or by government), explainability and assurance of AI model outputs, cybersecurity, data privacy and security throughout the lifecycle of AI system development and deployment (to include security against AI model attacks), risks, regulation and governance, technical and safety standards, national security and defense, research and development, education and workforce, innovation and competition, intellectual property, procurement, international collaboration, and export controls."

Responses are due by March 15, 2025, and will be "taken into consideration in the development of the AI Action Plan," the NSF said.

For more information, read the NSF notice on the Federal Register here.

About the Author

Rhea Kelly is editor in chief for Campus Technology, THE Journal, and Spaces4Learning. She can be reached at [email protected].

Featured

  • glowing futuristic laptop with a holographic screen displaying digital text

    New Turnitin Product Brings AI-Powered Tools to Students with Instructor Guardrails

    Academic integrity solution provider Turnitin has introduced Turnitin Clarity, a paid add-on for Turnitin Feedback Studio that provides a composition workspace for students with educator-guided AI assistance, AI-generated writing feedback, visibility into integrity insights, and more.

  • From Fire TV to Signage Stick: University of Utah's Digital Signage Evolution

    Jake Sorensen, who oversees sponsorship and advertising and Student Media in Auxiliary Business Development at the University of Utah, has navigated the digital signage landscape for nearly 15 years. He was managing hundreds of devices on campus that were incompatible with digital signage requirements and needed a solution that was reliable and lowered labor costs. The Amazon Signage Stick, specifically engineered for digital signage applications, gave him the stability and design functionality the University of Utah needed, along with the assurance of long-term support.

  • Abstract AI circuit board pattern

    New Nonprofit to Work Toward Safer, Truthful AI

    Turing Award-winning AI researcher Yoshua Bengio has launched LawZero, a new nonprofit aimed at developing AI systems that prioritize safety and truthfulness over autonomy.

  • two large brackets facing each other with various arrows, circles, and rectangles flowing between them

    1EdTech Partners with DXtera to Support Ed Tech Interoperability

    1EdTech Consortium and DXtera Institute have announced a partnership aimed at improving access to learning data in postsecondary and higher education.