Creatively critical tech virtual fall 2025 speaker series
This fall, the Creatively Critical Tech: Research + Practice + Design virtual speaker series will host four leading scholars whose work advances innovative and inclusive research, art, design, and practice with emerging technologies and media.
The series is hosted by the Education Now Lab, a community-engaged research-practice lab with interdisciplinary partners across campus. It is supported by an Advancing Research and Creative Scholarship Tier II grant through the Illinois State University Office of Research. Visit the Education Now Lab website to learn more, register for the series, and access recordings of previous sessions.
The Education Now Lab is led by Dr. Anna Smith, the 2025-2026 Provost Fellow and an associate professor in the School of Teaching and Learning.
“This has quickly become a favorite speaker series with attendees in time zones across the world,” Smith said. “This year, these leading scholars will engage us in a range of timely topics, including innovative forms of research-creation, inequities in technology in education, and issues and opportunities in generative artificial intelligence, education, and accessibility.”
The series is an initiative of Advancing Research and Creative Scholarship (ARCS), sponsored by the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs at Illinois State.
Schedule of events (all times central):
Research-Creation between Art and Anthropology
- Dr. Kate Hennessy, Simon Fraser University
- October 7, 2025, at 10 a.m.
Access is Capture: How Edtech Reproduces Racial Inequality
- Dr. Roderic N. Crooks, University of California Irvine
- October 15, 2025, at 7 p.m.
AI Grief Observed: On the Death of Education
- Audrey Watters
- November 12, 2025, at 6:30 p.m.
Opportunities and Challenges at the Intersection of AI, Disability, and Accessibility
- Dr. Cynthia Bennett, Google Research
- November 19, 2025, at 6:30 p.m.
Latest Publications
- Queer Talks to explore Girth & Mirth clubs November 19Queer Coalition, Illinois State's sponsored LGBTQIA+ faculty, staff, and graduate student affinity group, invites the University community to attend a lunchtime presentation November 19 by Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program Interim Director Dr. Jason Whitesel on the history and visual representation of Girth & Mirth clubs from their advent in 1970s San Francisco through their last hurrah in the early 2000s. This event will take place from 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. in 401 Stevenson Hall.
- Nominations open for 2026 Strand Diversity and staff awards through November 21Nominations are open through Friday, November 21, at 4:30 p.m., for the 2026 David A. Strand Diversity Achievement Award, Administrative/Professional and Civil Service Distinguished Service Awards, Administrative Professional Emerging Leader Award, Team Excellence Award, and the Environmental Stewardship Award.
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- Summer bridge program for first-year Science IS-U ScholarsThis summer, first-year STEM students in the Science IS-U Scholars Program came to the Illinois State campus for a 6-week bridge program designed to support their transition to ISU and their STEM majors, build a STEM cohort community, and lay the foundation for their role as civically engaged scientists.
- Preterm birth influences reading and math outcomes in adolescenceA new longitudinal study by Dr. Jamie Mahurin-Smith demonstrates that preterm birth continues to affect children's academic skills, even when they reach adolescence.
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