ESDS Advanced is a four-week applied intensive from the North Carolina Institute for Climate Studies (NCICS), running in two parts: two weeks in summer 2026 (the back-to-back weeks of July 20 and July 27) and two weeks in winter 2026–27 (dates TBD). It has one goal: to make you faster and more effective as a scientist by putting generative AI to work in your research — and giving you the judgment to trust the results.
This is not a survey course. Every week mixes lectures with hands-on practice on real problems, and you finish with three concrete capabilities:
Scientific Quality comes First
The philosophy behind this course is simple: AI should raise the standard of your science, not lower it. Every tool and technique we teach is paired with validation — checking agent output against ground truth, evaluating models rigorously, and telling quality work from AI slop. Speed without trust isn't science, and we deliberately designed this course to prioritize scientific rigor over speed shortcuts.
The structure of the course that will be repeated throughout each week is: 1) Teach the fundamentals so you understand what is happening under the hood, 2) Show you what the tools can do with hands on practice, and 3) Demonstrate all the failure modes, caveats, limitations, and danger zones you need to know to use them safely and effectively.
The core skill we want you to leave with is Discernment the ability to discriminate between good and bad AI output and know intuitively and explicitly when and how to use AI tools effectively to achieve your scientific goals.
Register for ESDS Advanced here — please register before the course begins on July 20, 2026.
By the end of the course you should be able to:
Four weeks, each with a core focus:
See each week's schedule in the sidebar for day-by-day timing and topics, and the Setup & Day 0 Checklist for what to do before July 20.