Speaking & Consulting

I study how colleges and universities are making decisions about AI, especially when those decisions affect students. A lot of the conversation in higher education has focused on what AI can do and how quickly people can learn to use it. I am more interested in when AI is actually appropriate for a particular task, what changes when the stakes are high, and what educators and institutions need to consider before adopting it.

My recent work focuses especially on AI ethics, privacy, trustworthy AI, and professional judgment in higher education. I am interested in questions such as what happens to student information when we use generative AI or automated systems, when AI should and should not be used in student-facing work, and how faculty and staff can have a meaningful role in decisions about AI even when they are not technical experts.

I speak with faculty, student affairs professionals, institutional leaders, graduate students, and professional associations about these issues. Depending on the audience, talks and workshops might focus broadly on responsible AI use in higher education or more specifically on AI privacy, AI literacy, student trust, or the use of AI in student affairs.

One area I talk about frequently is how to decide when AI is appropriate to use. Rather than starting with the tool, I ask participants to consider the context: How high are the stakes? What information is being shared? Can the output be checked? What happens if the system gets something wrong? Who has meaningful oversight? Can the person affected question or refuse its use?

I also speak about privacy and student trust. Privacy is often treated as a secondary concern in conversations about AI, even though many AI tools depend on large amounts of personal or institutional data. My work on privacy literacy asks people to look closely at what information is being collected, where it is going, who has access to it, and whether that flow of information makes sense in the educational context - particularly in higher-stakes college contexts.

A third part of my work focuses on AI literacy among higher education and student affairs professionals. Faculty and staff do not need to become computer scientists to participate in AI governance. They already bring important expertise about students, policy, institutional culture, ethics, equity, and professional practice. My research examines what additional knowledge and confidence professionals need to critically evaluate AI and participate in decisions about how it is used.

I am an Associate Professor of Higher Education and Student Affairs at Morgan State University and the Morgan State lead for the NSF Institute for Trustworthy AI in Law & Society. My research sits at the intersection of higher education, technology, and online learning, with recent work on AI literacy, privacy, deepfakes, trustworthy AI, and technology-mediated learning.

I am available for invited talks, keynotes, workshops, leadership briefings, and selected consulting projects related to responsible AI use, privacy, AI governance, and professional learning. I can work with a broad higher education audience or adapt existing material for a particular group or institutional context.

I am available for virtual and in-person engagements. Contact me.