Interview, Fireside Chat
Kuhan Jeyapragasan on effective altruism university groups (2022)
- Plans to produce content tailored to specific audience interests for smaller audiences, including the 80,000 Hours podcast and ADK After Hours.
- Search for a new audio editor with at least one year of experience and mission alignment is underway to support increased content creation for the 80,000 Hours podcast and ADK After Hours.
- Official operations for the Stanford Effective Altruism group are scheduled to commence in September 2019 following a summer planning period.
- Strategies to foster an expansive group culture while avoiding member attrition and emphasizing career planning, cause prioritization, and ambition are central to group development.
- Outreach methods will prioritize rigorous thinking, uncertainty, and emotional resonance over sales pitches to encourage serious engagement, alongside plans to utilize guest speakers with deep expertise.
- Community growth expectations include rapid expansion of the effective altruism research capacity, infrastructure, and the development of EA hubs, co-working spaces, and mentorship partnerships.
- Support mechanisms for new organizers include the University Group Accelerator program run by Jessica McCurdy, a new CEA website, and updates to the EA Groups resources page.
- Anticipated career evolution in the sector features rapid growth in funding, full-time roles, and the number of community building positions.
- Specific initiatives at Stanford include the continued operation of the Stanford Existential Risk Initiative's summer research fellowship, virtual conference, and postdoc hiring, with plans to hire additional full-time staff shortly.
- The "Preventing Human Extinction" class is expected to maintain high enrollment as a first-year Thinking Matters option, with a focus on improving the pipeline connecting students to full-time existential risk roles.
- Personal career reflection over the next two to five years will investigate higher impact options to ensure effective use of time and agency.
- A warning is issued regarding the risk of burnout caused by an overemphasis on top-of-the-funnel outreach at the expense of supporting deeply engaged members.
- Future success is expected to rely on establishing rigorous intellectual environments with accountability mechanisms to help members solve bottlenecks and increase impact.
- There is an identified need for expanded meta-EA and community building efforts beyond university groups, specifically in cause-area-specific field building and governance.