The research for computer vision and machine learning has made great progress in recent years. Many problems in vision can be solved using learning method. Hence, the combination of computer vision, machine learning and pattern recognition methods became a mainstream. In order to promote the development of this field and promote cultural, scientific and technological exchanges between China and United States, “1st Sino-USA Summer School in Vision, Learning, and Pattern Recognition 2009” was held in Beijing (20th - 28th July, 2009) successfully with funding from NLPR of CASIA, NSF, Google and Intel.