Penn State College of Education names faculty director for AI literacy and innovation

Penn State's College of Education has named Priya Sharma, associate professor of learning, design and technology, as its faculty director for AI Literacy and Innovation, effective Aug. 1 for a two-year term. She will work with interim associate dean for faculty affairs Susan Land and faculty across the college to advance faculty AI literacy and support thoughtful, ethical uses of AI in teaching and research. Dean Gwendolyn Lloyd said the role will help faculty navigate AI's opportunities and challenges and serve as a connector between faculty and academic leadership.

The appointment places AI literacy work inside a university college's faculty development structure rather than only at the student tool level, which directly affects how teacher training, course design and teaching ethics discussions are organized. For AI education product providers, the college's plan to invite vendors to demonstrate tools and have faculty critique them suggests a more institutionalized entry point for procurement and design feedback. The role has just begun, so results can only be verified through later faculty participation, case studies and ethics framework outputs. University colleges may create similar faculty AI literacy roles, moving teacher training from scattered talks toward sustained mechanisms. The path for AI education products into universities may add collective faculty evaluation, concentrating product design feedback.