Honoring the visionary legacy of the MIT Media Lab’s founders

Jerome Wiesner and Nicholas Negroponte founded the MIT Media Lab on a radical belief: that invention happens at the edges, not in silos. 

Wiesner, a former MIT provost and presidential science advisor, believed deeply in the power of interdisciplinary research to address real-world challenges. Negroponte brought that vision to life by building a new kind of research community — one that trusted people, encouraged learning across boundaries, and embraced fearless experimentation.

The Wiesner–Negroponte Founders Fellowship honors the founders of the MIT Media Lab by supporting visionary inventors and researchers whose ideas defy boundaries and shape the future. Inspired by their defining qualities — vision, risk, and care — the fellowship celebrates the belief that creativity emerges from difference, that bold experimentation is a duty, and that human connection fuels innovation. Together, Wiesner and Negroponte championed trust, learning, and invention unconstrained by traditional silos. This fellowship continues that legacy by empowering students who imagine audaciously, take risks with purpose, and care deeply about the people their work serves.

The fellowship

The Wiesner–Negroponte Founders Fellowship will back students who embrace audacious ideas, cross disciplinary boundaries, and expand the circle of inclusion and innovation. It invests in visionaries — people whose thinking helps us imagine and build a better future.

We are seeking to raise $2 million to fully name and endow the Wiesner–Negroponte Founders Fellowship Fund. Once endowed, the Fellowship will support one Media Lab graduate student — at either the master’s or PhD level — enabling their full participation in the Lab’s radically interdisciplinary and boundary-crossing research community. This enduring fund will ensure that the founders’ legacy continues to empower future generations of fearless innovators.

Now is the time to act. 

Join us by contributing to the fellowship that will carry our founders' legacy forward by empowering the next generation of fearless, boundary-crossing innovators.

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