UW-Madison Names CDIS Director Founding Dean of New AI College

The University of Wisconsin-Madison has named Remzi Arpaci-Dusseau as the founding dean of its new College of Computing and Artificial Intelligence (CAI), effective July 1, 2026. The appointment marks the first academic division created at the university since 1983, according to official documentation from the CAI launch website.

Arpaci-Dusseau currently directs the School of Computer, Data and Information Sciences (CDIS), whose programs will largely transition into the new college structure by 2027-28. He has been a professor at UW-Madison since 2000 and holds both his master's and PhD from UC-Berkeley. The transition isn't permanent leadership, though. A national dean search with community input will begin in 2028 for the college's "next phase of growth," per a message from chancellor Jennifer Mnookin and provost John Zumbrunnen.

The financial backing is substantial. Private donors through the Catalyst Collective have committed $100 million to CAI, filling the gap between the $36 million in transferred program operations funding and the anticipated $85 million overall budget. UW-Madison itself is committing $50 million annually. The largest contributors include Andy Konwinski (founder of Databricks and Perplexity AI), Cisco CEO John Morgridge, Signe Ostby, Scott Cook, Doximity CEO Jeff Tangney, and healthcare software company Epic.

That money will fund 50 new faculty positions under the RISE-AI hiring initiative, bringing total AI-related faculty hires to more than 100. The college will house existing degree programs in computer sciences, data science, statistics, library science, and information science. It will also create new courses, certificates, and majors reflecting AI's growing importance across industries.

Student enrollment numbers suggest strong demand. In fall 2025, over 3,000 students were enrolled in computer science, 1,700 in data science, and 500 in information sciences. According to a Journal Sentinel analysis, UW-Madison computer and information sciences majors earn a median of $115,954 four years after graduation—the fourth highest-earning bachelor's program at any Wisconsin institution. That's the kind of metric that makes administrators sit up and take notice (even if they won't admit it publicly).

The college's stated mission emphasizes interdisciplinary work, connecting technical experts with philosophers, ethicists, and business leaders. Arpaci-Dusseau has "led the effort" to create CAI since 2024, according to the university's press release. He told reporters that universities have a responsibility to "ask hard questions about their impacts, guide innovation thoughtfully and prepare students to thrive in a changing world."

The physical reality of this expansion will unfold in Morgridge Hall, where the college will open its doors. Students will navigate new administrative structures, updated course catalogs, and potentially new degree requirements as programs migrate from CDIS to CAI. The transition period means faculty and staff will manage dual reporting lines for months, a logistical friction point that rarely appears in press releases.

Arpaci-Dusseau co-leads a research group with his wife, fellow computer science professor Andrea Arpaci-Dusseau, and serves as Special Advisor to the Provost on Computing. Provost Zumbrunnen noted that Arpaci-Dusseau has been "an integral part of the leadership team that has helped make CDIS strong since its inception in 2019."

The Board of Regents approved the college in December 2025, granting UW-Madison authority to create the new academic division. The next several months involve continued engagement with university governance and cross-campus consultation to shape further aspects of its creation. Whether the $100 million in philanthropic commitments translates into sustained research output or just fancy office space remains to be seen.

For students, the immediate impact is minimal. Existing majors continue under current structures while the college establishes its operational framework. The real question isn't whether the college will launch—it will. It's whether this organizational shift actually improves student outcomes or simply adds another layer of administrative overhead to an already complex university bureaucracy.

Artūras Malašauskas is an AI Systems Integrator with 20+ years of production-grade web engineering experience. He has designed, shipped, and scaled enterprise Python/PHP systems for logistics, SaaS, and public-sector clients. For the past year, he has focused exclusively on AI integrations: deploying open-source LLMs, building generative media pipelines (image, audio, video), and engineering multi-agent workflows for real production environments. His standard: reproducibility, security, cost-efficient inference—no vaporware. He documents and evaluates emerging AI tooling, separating verified capabilities from marketing noise. Technical editor at: muza-ai.eu, ai-verslas.lt, ai-naujinos.lt Connect on LinkedIn