The vision of THI is to provide educational opportunities that serve humanist and secular communities in world where humanism is widely accepted and respected life-stance.

The institute was founded to educate and train effective leaders, organizers, and advocates for a variety of organizational settings, including within the humanist movement itself.

[2] The idea for the Humanist Institute originated in Pittsburgh in 1976 and was the brainchild of Paul Beattie, a Unitarian Universalist minister.

The first class with students from the AEU, AHA, UUA, and SHJ gathered in New York at the Ethical Culture center for the first seminar with Howard Radest as mentor.

In 2012, the Kochhar Online Humanist Education (KOHE) courses were added to the institute's offerings.

KOHE provides an array of self-guided courses introducing individuals to humanism and giving a means to explore at basic level humanist theory and practice.