GENERATIVE AI LEAD, STATE & LOCAL GOVERNMENT,

GOOGLE AI

Amina Al Sherif is the author of the Nadiri fiction series. Originally from Cairo Egypt, she immigrated to the United States in 2010 as a first generation Arab-American and African American. Amina is a member of the LGBTQ+ community as well as a BIPOC writer.

Amina has worked with the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) for over ten years as a United States Army officer. She has deployed to Baghdad, Iraq, Northern Syria, Turkey, Israel, as well as Afghanistan supporting the Special Operations Community.

A graduate of Penn State University, Amina holds a BA in Linguistics and Arabic from the University of Mississippi and a Masters in Professional Studies in Cybersecurity and Information Sciences. She is currently attending the University of Texas in San Antonio to pursue a career in astrophysics at the PhD level while maintaining a career in cybersecurity, data science, and technology.

Amina regularly blogs on Medium documenting her self-taught technical career, and maintains a literary blog on her website.  In January 2020, she published her first book An Approach to Machine Learning in Cyber Defense for the Department of Defense.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,

TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION RESOURCES

Amanda Crawford is the Executive Director of the Texas Department of Information Resources (DIR) and serves as the Chief Information Officer for the State of Texas. In this role, she is responsible for the overall leadership and daily operations of DIR, an agency with an annual fiscal profile of more than $5 billion. DIR's responsibilities include protecting the state's data and critical technology infrastructure, managing a multi-billion dollar cooperative contracts program, and providing strategic technology leadership and solutions to all levels of Texas government.
Prior to leading the team at DIR, Mandy served at the Office of the Attorney General of Texas (OAG) for more than 17 years. She held various positions at the OAG, including ultimately serving for two and a half years as the Deputy Attorney General for Administration and General Counsel. Mandy is a graduate of The University of Texas at Austin and earned her law degree from the University of Houston Law Center.

SENIOR ECONOMIST,

INDEED HIRING LAB

Daniel Culbertson is a Senior Economist at the Indeed Hiring Lab with a focus on the US labor market. Daniel previously specialized in regional analysis and forecasting as an economist with Moody’s Analytics and holds a master's degree in economics.

ASSISTANT DEAN FOR STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT ENGAGEMENT;  PROFESSOR OF PRACTICE,

LBJ SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS

Sherri R. Greenberg is a professor of practice and fellow of the Max Sherman Chair in State and Local Government at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, and she is a professor of practice at the Steve Hicks School of Social Work. Additionally, she is the LBJ School Assistant Dean for State and Local Government Engagement. She is a primary researcher for, and is Chairperson elect of, Good Systems, The University of Texas Grand Challenge regarding ethical AI. Greenberg is a member of the Board of the Austin Convention Center Enterprise. She also serves on the Austin Smart City Alliance Board of Directors, and the Austin Forum on Technology & Society Advisory Board. Previously, she was a member of the Central Health Board of Managers, and a member of the City of Austin Housing Investment Review Committee.

Greenberg has served as a senior advisor to Austin Mayor Steve Adler. She was a Texas state representative from 1991 to 2001, and she chaired the House Pensions and Investments Committee and the Select Committee on Teacher Health Insurance. She also served on the House Appropriations, Economic Development, Elections, and Science and Technology Committees. Previously, Greenberg was the City of Austin capital finance manager, and a public finance officer at Standard & Poor’s.

Her teaching and research interests include: technology policy, state and local government, housing, homelessness, transportation, healthcare, public finance, and campaigns and elections. Recently, she has had funding from the National Science Foundation, the City of Austin, UT Good Systems, the IBM Center for the Business of Government, the Cisco Foundation, Microsoft, MITRE, and the State of Texas.

VICE PROVOST FOR ACADEMIC AFFAIRS,

OFFICE OF THE EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT AND PROVOST

Art Markman is the Annabel Irion Worsham Centennial Professor of Psychology, Human Dimensions of Organizations, and Marketing and Vice Provost for Academic Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin. He has written over 150 papers on topics including reasoning, decision making, and motivation. Art brings insights from cognitive science to a broader audience through his blogs at Psychology Today and Fast Company as well as his radio show/podcast Two Guys on Your Head. He is the author of several books including Smart Thinking, Smart Change, Brain Briefs, and Bring Your Brain to Work.

DOCTORAL STUDENT,

WALKER DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING

Carlos Salazar is a Mechanical Engineering scholar currently pursuing a doctorate with a keen focus on making smart tools inclusive and accessible for all. Carlos delves into the realms of Design and Development of Smart Tools, Human/Tool Collaboration, and Low-Resource Sensing and tinyML (Machine Learning on edge devices). His research methodology integrates Physics-Based Modeling and Controls, emphasizing Experimentation, Sensing, and Physical Signal Modeling and Analysis. Beyond academia, Carlos is driven by a curiosity that seeks to bridge gaps between technology and human experience, showcasing his commitment to a future where smart tools seamlessly enhance daily life for diverse communities.

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR,

DEPARTMENT OF CIVIL, ARCHITECTURAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING

Jun-Whan Lee is an assistant professor in the Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin. His research is focused on coastal hazards, climate and coastal resilience, nature-based solutions, coastal risk assessments, and coastal processes. He obtained his Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Virginia Tech in 2021. He completed his B.S. (2012) and M.S. (2014) degrees in Civil and Environmental Engineering at Hanyang University, South Korea. From 2014 to 2017, he worked as a coastal hazard researcher at the National Institute of Meteorological Sciences in South Korea. After obtaining his Ph.D., he served as a postdoctoral associate at the Center for Coastal Studies at Virginia Tech before joining The University of Texas at Austin in 2023.

POSTDOCTORAL FELLOW,

SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE

Dr. Kijin Seong is a postdoctoral research fellow in the School of Architecture at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research focuses on developing integrative smart city solutions that encompass urban resilience, equity, and livability. Specifically, she is interested in exploring how urban informatics and new technologies can enhance disaster resilience, emergency response, climate change adaptation, and environmental equity. Dr. Kijin Seong earned her Ph.D. in Urban and Regional Sciences from Texas A&M University in 2021. She has been supported and involved in diverse projects funded by the Good Systems at the University of Texas at Austin, the National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Texas Sea-Grant, and Texas A&M University.  

ERNEST A. SHARPE CENTENNIAL PROFESSOR,

SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM AND MEDIA

S. Craig Watkins is the Executive Director of the IC2 Institute and Ernest A. Sharpe Centennial Professor in the Moody College of Communication at The University of Texas at Austin. His research examines the digital and data divides, computer-mediated technologies and human behavior, and the social and ethical implications of artificial intelligence. Craig is one of the Principal Investigators for UT Austin’s Good Systems Grand Challenge, a University-funded research initiative that examines the social, technical, and ethical implications of artificial intelligence. Craig’s team explores the racial equity implications of artificial intelligence, focusing on how implicit biases, for example, in datasets, model formulation, and deployment can lead to disparate impacts, especially in high stakes contexts such as healthcare and policing. In his role as Executive Director of the IC2 Institute, Craig is leading a new initiative to innovate in the health equity space. 

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR,

DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE

Greg Durrett is an associate professor of Computer Science at UT Austin. His current research studies techniques for reasoning about knowledge in text, how to verify correctness of generation methods, and how to build systems using LLMs as primitives. He is a 2023 Sloan Research Fellow and a recipient of a 2022 NSF CAREER award, among other grants from agencies including the NSF, Open Philanthropy, DARPA, Salesforce, and Amazon. He completed his Ph.D. at UC Berkeley where he was advised by Dan Klein, and he was previously a research scientist at Semantic Machines.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,

MOVABILITY

Lonny Stern is the Executive Director of Movability, which works to advance commuting options that reduce traffic congestion, improve air quality, and enhance the economic vitality of Central Texas. Lonny has worked in a variety of roles, including as a Public Involvement Manager at the Austin Transit Partnership, Community Engagement Administrator for CapMetro, Senior Director of the STEM Council at Skillpoint Alliance; and Outreach Director at Empower Texans (formerly CPPP) and Communications & Outreach Director for Hope Street Group -- both nonpartisan policy organizations. He has held additional roles at aGLIFF, 91.7FM - KOOP Radio, and Project Transitions, and he has been a member of Movability's board of directors since 2019. Lonny earned his master’s degree at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at UT-Austin. He earned a BA in English & Communications at Florida State University.  
He has been recognized with various awards, including: Air Central Texas Outstanding Organization Award (2023); IAP2 - Core Values Award "Project Connect" (2022); ACT - Commuting Options - Public Transit - "Transit Adventures" (2019); Austin Under 40 Award for Community Service & Non-profit (2015); The Austin American-Statesman – Fortunate 500 (2006); and Austin Chronicle " Mover & Shaker" (2002) & "Hardest Working Man in the Non-Profit Business" (2001). 

POSTDOCTORAL FELLOW,
CHANDRA DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL AND COMPUTER ENGINEERING

Junyuan is a postdoctoral fellow hosted by Dr. Zhangyang Wang in the VITA group, Institute for Foundations of Machine Learning (IFML) and Wireless Networking and Communications Group (WNCG) at UT Austin. He obtained his Ph.D. degree from Computer Science and Engineering at ILLIDAN Lab@Michigan State University (MSU), advised by Dr. Jiayu Zhou. Lately, his research endeavors have primarily revolved around medical predictive modeling and intervention strategies for cognitive dementia diseases, with a particular emphasis on harnessing the power of large language models. Junyuan also dedicates his efforts towards exploring the theories and algorithms underpinning privacy-preserving learning, striving to ensure fairness, robustness, security, and inclusiveness in the process.

Troy DeFrates (pronounced: da-fray-tus) has lived in Austin, TX since 1993. He was born in Oklahoma City and grew ups in the NW Houston suburb - Klein, TX.  
Troy is currently serving as interim Dean for the Design, Manufacturing, Construction, and Applied Technologies division at Austin Community College (ACC) where he oversees 11 workforce education departments including, Manufacturing, Automotive, Building Construction, Welding, Agriculture Sciences, and Architectural-Engineering Computer Aided Design, and HVAC.  
Troy’s career in higher education began in 2006 where he taught welding and blacksmithing as an adjunct professor at ACC. In 2010, Troy was awarded a full-time faculty position of Welding Technology at ACC where he soon began serving the college as Assistant Department Chair. In 2015, Troy was named as the Department Chair for the Welding Technology program where he served until becoming interim dean of the division in July 2023. 
Prior to working in higher education, Troy had a career as a professional welder, welding inspector, and architectural metal worker. Prior to discovering welding, Troy has worked in various workforce fields such as manufacturing, construction, automotive service, and as part of a management training program in Philadelphia, PA for Waste Management, Inc. 
Troy has an Associate Degree in Welding Technology from ACC, a Bachelor’s degree in Occupational Education from Texas State, and is currently pursuing an MBA from Lamar University in Construction Project Management.

ANDREW H. AND ANN R. TISCH PROFESSOR OF INFORMATION SCIENCE & FOUNDING DIRECTOR,

CORNELL TECH & DIGITAL LIFE INITIATIVE

Helen Nissenbaum is the Andrew H. and Ann R. Tisch Professor of Information Science and the founding director of the Digital Life Initiative at Cornell Tech. Her research spans issues of bias, trust, security, autonomy, and accountability in digital systems, most notably, privacy as contextual integrity. Professor Nissenbaum’s publications include the books Obfuscation: A User's Guide for Privacy and Protest, with Finn Brunton (MIT Press, 2015), Values at Play in Digital Games, with Mary Flanagan (MIT Press, 2014), and Privacy in Context: Technology, Policy, and the Integrity of Social Life (Stanford, 2010). She received the 2014 Barwise Prize from the American Philosophical Association and the IACAP Covey Award for computing, ethics, and philosophy. Professor Nissenbaum has also contributed to privacy-enhancing free software, such as TrackMeNot (designed to prevent the profiling of web search histories) and  AdNauseam (designed to counter profiling based on ad clicks). She holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from Stanford University and a B.A. (Hons) in Philosophy and Mathematics from the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa.

PROFESSOR OF COMPUTER SCIENCE,

NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY

Kristian Hammond is the Bill and Cathy Osborn Professor of Computer Science at Northwestern University and the co-founder of the Artificial Intelligence company Narrative Science (recently acquired by Salesforce). He has spent most of his career focused on the problem of making machines smarter. His research is aimed at bridging the human/machine communication gap between the data we gather and the information that is locked within it.

Since the fall of 2016, he has been the faculty lead of Northwestern’s CS + X initiative, exploring how computational thinking can be used to transform fields such as the law, medicine, and education. He also directs Northwestern’s Master of Science in Artificial Intelligence as well as the Center for Advancing Safety of Machine Intelligence. In January of 2023, he was named a Fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence.

He believes in humanizing computers with the aim of stopping the process of mechanizing people. Kris received his PhD from Yale.

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF PRACTICE,

COMPUTER SCIENCE

Hart is an assistant professor of practice with the College of Natural Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin and a postdoctoral fellow affiliated with the Building-Wide Intelligence Project and the Learning Agents Research Group under the supervision of professor Peter Stone in the Department of Computer Science. Currently Hart is working on semantic mapping, autonomous human-robot interaction, and artificial intelligence representations and architectures for service robots. He received his M.S., M.Phil, and Ph.D. from Yale University, his M.Eng from Cornell University, and his B.S. from West Virginia University.

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE,

DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNICATION STUDIES

Yifan Xu is a doctoral candidate in Organizational Communication & Technology at The University of Texas at Austin. Her research concerns communicative practices in the space of technology and inquires how we can develop/implement technologies that are supportive of equitable and ethical outcomes.

DEPUTY VICE PRESIDENT FOR RESEARCH,

OFFICE OF THE VICE PRESIDENT FOR RESEARCH, SCHOLARSHIP AND CREATIVE ENDEAVORS

Jennifer Lyon Gardner, Ph.D., is UT’s Deputy Vice President for Research and has led research capacity-building efforts at the university since 2008. She designs and implements programming that promotes collaborative research, such as UT’s campus-wide research grand challenge program, Bridging Barriers, and Associate Professor Experimental (APX), a three-day networking and proposal-writing retreat for newly tenured faculty. She also leads the Research Development group, which provides competitive intelligence and proposal development guidance to research teams pursuing major external funding.

Dr. Gardner received her undergraduate degree from Penn State University in chemistry with a minor in English, and she received her Ph.D. in analytical chemistry from The University of Texas at Austin. She was a research-track faculty member at the UT Health Science Center in Houston before returning to UT Austin in 2008 to work in research development.

Before joining the Office of the Vice President for Research, Scholarship, and Creative Endeavors, Dr. Gardner founded the College of Natural Sciences’ Strategic Research Initiatives team and served as its director. She also has served on the Board of Directors for the National Organization of Research Development Professionals (NORDP) and was an inaugural recipient of the organization’s Rising Star Award.

TRUCHARD FOUNDATION CHAIR IN COMPUTER SCIENCE,

DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE

Dr. Peter Stone holds the Truchard Foundation Chair in Computer Science at the University of Texas at Austin. He is Associate Chair of the Computer Science Department, as well as Director of Texas Robotics. In 2013 he was awarded the University of Texas System Regents' Outstanding Teaching Award and in 2014 he was inducted into the UT Austin Academy of Distinguished Teachers, earning him the title of University Distinguished Teaching Professor. Professor Stone's research interests in Artificial Intelligence include machine learning (especially reinforcement learning), multiagent systems, and robotics. Professor Stone received his Ph.D in Computer Science in 1998 from Carnegie Mellon University. From 1999 to 2002 he was a Senior Technical Staff Member in the Artificial Intelligence Principles Research Department at AT&T Labs - Research. He is an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, Guggenheim Fellow, AAAI Fellow, IEEE Fellow, AAAS Fellow, ACM Fellow, Fulbright Scholar, and 2004 ONR Young Investigator. In 2007 he received the prestigious IJCAI Computers and Thought Award, given biannually to the top AI researcher under the age of 35, and in 2016 he was awarded the ACM/SIGAI Autonomous Agents Research Award. Professor Stone co-founded Cogitai, Inc., a startup company focused on continual learning, in 2015, and currently serves as Executive Director of Sony AI America.

PHILIP G. WARNER REGENTS PROFESSOR IN COMMUNICATION,

SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM AND MEDIA

Dr. Strover is the Philip G. Warner Regents Professor in Communication and former Chair of the Radio-TV-Film Department at the University of Texas, where she teaches communications and telecommunications courses and co-directs the Technology and Information Policy Institute. Some of her current research projects examine local and statewide networks and broadband services; the digital divide; rural broadband deployment; telecommunications infrastructure deployment and economic development in rural regions; and Artificial Intelligence issues including social media-based disinformation as well as publicly-deployed technologies. Her most recent publications examine disinformation strategies associated with Russian Facebook ads; local broadband deployment strategies around the world; and the role of broadband in rural regions. Her current undergraduate and graduate teaching addresses communication law and policy, the relationship between technology and culture, and the ethics of artificial intelligence. She has had visiting appointments at several universities around the world including the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Westminster University, Stockholm University, the New University of Lisbon, Aarhus University, among others. Her research has been supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Utilities Service, the U.S. Federal Communication Commission, the government of Portugal, the Center for Rural Strategies, the European Union, The Appalachian Regional Commission, several State of Texas Commissions and departments, the Institute for Museum and Library Services, Facebook, Google and others.