Around July last year I decided I was going to go all in on technical AI safety research. To do that I’d need to get into an AI safety fellowship, quit my job, and sell everything that was in my flat in South Africa (hopefully in that order).

I applied to every fellowship that was open[1], and got rejected from several of them before being accepted into MATS on Team Shard around mid-November. I handed in my notice the following Monday, and told my landlady that I had to move out in 6 weeks because I was leaving the country.

MATS went great! My co-author and I got the first spotlight talk at the MATS Symposium, we’ve submitted to NeurIPS, and I’m more hopeful than ever that I’ll be able to help reduce x-risk.

Things are good, but they could be so much better

I’m hoping that any goodwill I earned from this post can be sacrificed as a peace offering allows me to make suggestions without people assuming I have ill intent. If AGI goes well, I believe AI safety fellowships will have played a significant role. I hope these fellowships can become even more effective than they [...]

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Outline:

(00:52) Things are good, but they could be so much better

(01:22) Don't say "we were impressed by your profile" unless you mean it

(04:00) Make the whole application timeline clear upfront

(04:49) Word limits, character limits, and timed forms

(06:26) Proctored tests are a terrible, terrible time

(09:11) Make it clear who you've accepted in the past

(10:03) Be aware of other fellowships' deadlines

(11:05) Be aware of your own deadlines

(12:07) Fellowships compete for fellows

(12:37) Anywhere-on-earth is the only timezone that matters

(12:50) Your application is probably northern-hemisphere centric

The original text contained 1 footnote which was omitted from this narration.

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First published:
May 18th, 2026

Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jmGvMSnkemSPLs6qv/advice-on-interviewing-candidates-for-ai-safety-fellowships

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.