About the LaCross AI Institute
About the LaCross AI Institute
Respect for People, Practice & Technology
Our Approach
We don’t know what the future of AI will be.
We do know that siloed thinking won’t provide answers.
Darden prepares responsible leaders for business. The business of artificial intelligence needs this leadership more than ever.
With the LaCross Institute for Ethical Artificial Intelligence in Business, Darden strives to ensure that the good of all stakeholders — a signature of the School’s research, teaching and engagement — is factored into how AI’s enormous potential is applied in business contexts.
The Institute also serves as a connector for UVA, uniting other AI initiatives, centers and units. For instance, Darden and UVA School of Data Science's flourishing partnership focuses on the intersection of data science and business. The institute will empower UVA to coordinate and magnify its research, pedagogy, teaching and engagement in AI across UVA schools, institutes and research centers.
Our Values
At Darden, we’re on a mission to develop responsible leaders.
Our unparalleled, transformational learning experiences, delivered by faculty ranked the best in the world for bringing out the best in students, puts purpose in motion and leads to a lifetime of career advancement and impact.
About the LaCross Gift
One of the Largest AI Gifts to Any Business School in the World
In October 2023, Dave (MBA '78) and Kathy LaCross announced an historic gift of $101 million to Darden, indicating their aspiration to earmark $50 million to establish a Darden-led AI institute that would collaborate with UVA schools and initiatives working in a similar vein. The LaCross' investment in AI has since expanded to over $62 million to fund professorships in ethical AI in business, including a University Professorship and a practitioner chair in AI that will enable Darden to build on existing faculty strengths by recruiting additional world-leading faculty and professors of practice to advance teaching and research.
The new LaCross Institute for Ethical Artificial Intelligence in Business extends the work of Darden's AI Initiative, which was created in 2022 through an initial gift from the LaCrosses, with support from Darden's Institute for Business in Society and Batten Institute for Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Technology, and the Collaboratory for Applied Data Science in Business, launched in partnership with the UVA School of Data Science in 2021.
Academic Directors
Yael Grushka-Cockayne
Academic Director, and, by Courtesy, Data Science
Rajkumar Venkatesan
Academic Director
Our Experts
Gabrielle (Gabe) Adams
Associate Professor of Public Policy and Business Administration and, by Courtesy, Psychology (Social)
Michael Albert
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Rahul Bhandari
Lecturer and Dean's Fellow
Luca Cian
Killgallon Ohio Art Professor of Business Administration
Lillien Ellis
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Rupert Freeman
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Alex Gates
Assistant Professor of Data Science, UVA School of Data Science
Terence Johnson
Assistant Professor of Data Science, UVA School of Data Science
Dennie Kim
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Anton Korinek
Professor of Economics, Department of Economics, Professor, Darden School of Business
Timothy M. Laseter
Professor of Practice
Benjamin D. Leiner
Adjunct Lecturer
Michael Lenox
University Professor, Tayloe Murphy Professor of Business Administration
Anthony Palomba
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Bidhan L. Parmar
Associate Dean for Faculty Development , Shannon G. Smith Bicentennial Professor of Business Administration
Michael D. Porter
Associate Professor of Data Science, UVA School of Data Science
Roshni Raveendhran
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Administrative Leadership
Marc Ruggiano
Special Advisor for AI Initiatives
Staff
Gosia Glinska
Associate Director of Thought Leadership, Batten Institute
Megan Juelfs
Senior Associate Director of Research, Office of Research Support
Asif Mehedi
Associate Director for Research and Faculty Support, Office of Research Support
Maryelizabeth Point
Research Assistant
