Athena Mentorship Program for Women

Athena is a research mentorship program focused on increasing representation of women and marginalized genders in technical AI alignment research. It was founded by Claire Short, an independent researcher with backgrounds in neuroscience, data science, and AI safety who was also a 2024 Foresight Institute Fellow and has participated in the MATS AI alignment fellowship. The program runs roughly 10-week hybrid cohorts. Each cohort features a one-week in-person retreat and approximately two months of remote mentorship with established AI safety researchers. The inaugural cohort launched in January 2024 with a retreat held in Oxford, UK, featuring 12 mentors and 12 fellows. Mentors for the first cohort came from organizations including Anthropic, DeepMind, Redwood Research, Timaeus, MIRI, and academic institutions. A second cohort ran in fall 2025 (October 14 through December 22), with the in-person retreat in November. The program's three core justifications are: shifting field culture to retain qualified researchers who face systemic barriers, leveraging diverse perspectives to develop more comprehensive AI safety solutions, and building representation among women who may become future AI policy advisors. Claire Short has framed the program as evidence that pursuing AI safety and diversity goals simultaneously is not a trade-off but a complementary endeavor. Funding for the program has come from a Lightspeed grant (a partial grant of the amount requested) as well as community crowdfunding via Manifund. No public budget figures have been disclosed. The program is run by a small team led by Claire Short, who can be reached at claire@researchathena.org.