The College of Information, Data and Society (CIDS) is holding the 2026 Online Student Research Conference, March 3-5, 2026. The CIDS Conference connects students across the college and promotes student work, providing an opportunity for CIDS students to share their research work, to communicate and connect with each other, and ultimately to foster a stronger sense of community among students.

Conference Committee: Dr. Crystal Fausett, Dr. Mary Ann Harlan, Dr. James Hodges, Dr. Guannan Liu, Dr. Mohammad Masum, Isheah Al-Sumairi, Jessica Toth, and Dr. Virginia Tucker (Chair). Ava Wallace is the Conference Coordinating Assistant.

Live Opening & Closing Keynote Sessions

Opening Session: March 3, 2026, 12:00-1:00 pm (Pacific)   

    Zoom: https://sjsu.zoom.us/j/81306675755  Password: research26  (recording posted after the Conference)

    Keynote Speaker: Dr. Sandra Hirsh, Special Assistant to the Provost for AI Initiatives, San José State University

Title: “AI initiatives at San José State University and Their Wider Impact”

Description: [forthcoming]

Speaker Profile: With 30 years of experience across academia, user experience research, and product development, Dr. Sandra Hirsh brings a strategic vision to advancing educational initiatives. As the Special Assistant to the Provost for AI Initiatives at San José State University, Dr. Hirsh leads efforts to integrate AI tools and strategies into academic programs, partnering with campus and community stakeholders to expand access to cutting-edge learning. Her focus is on fostering innovation, collaboration, and student learning to enhance institutional impact.

Previously serving as Associate Dean of Academics in the College of Information, Data and Society, Dr. Hirsh spearheaded the creation of innovative academic programs, including the university’s first fully online undergraduate major. With extensive experience in strategic planning and program development, she is passionate about building systems that support faculty excellence and student success. Known for her expertise in AI, user behavior, and information science, Dr. Hirsh is motivated by a commitment to shaping the future of education and research.

Closing Session: March 5, 2026, 12:00-1:00 pm (Pacific) 

    Zoom: https://sjsu.zoom.us/j/81306675755  Password: research26  (recording posted after the Conference)

    Panel Session: “How involvement in research has life-changing impacts: Perspectives from students, faculty, and alumni”

    Panel Members: to be announced

Student Presentations

Student research presentations are captioned videos, 5 to 7 minutes long. Click a presentation from the list below to access its webpage, where you can read the abstract and view the recording. Presenters welcome your comments and questions about their research presentations. Please use the comment feature on the presenter’s page for this purpose.

Outstanding Student Presentation Awards: Five of the student presentations will be honored with an Outstanding Student Presentation Award, to be announced at the Closing Session on March 5th.

[student presentation pages will be available on the first day of the Conference, March 3, 2026]

The College of Professional and Global Education (CPGE)’s 2024 Online Student Conference is held during February 20-22, 2024. The Conference seeks to connect students across the college and promote student work and aims to provide an opportunity for CPGE students to share their school or professional work, help students communicate and connect with each other, and ultimately foster a stronger sense of community among students.

View Student Presentations on Conference Website

All 2024 Conference student presentations are pre-recorded videos viewable here.

Live Opening & Closing Session

Opening Session: February 20, 2024, 12:00-1:00 pm (Pacific)

Presentation Recording Link

Keynote Speaker: Dr. Bharat Mehra

Professor & EBSCO Endowed Chair in Social Justice
School of Library and Information Studies
University of Alabama
https://bmehra.people.ua.edu/

Title: Social Justice and Action Research to Extend the Field of Information: Dismantling White Entrenched Systemic Hegemonies

Description: Dr. Bharat Mehra will discuss social justice and action research intersections across his recent work in the field of information (including library and information science) to generate community-wide positive impacts. In the process he provides a critical positionality to his “voice” toward strategic actions that can dismantle white entrenched systemic hegemonies in research, teaching, service, and practice.

Biography: Dr. Mehra is EBSCO Endowed Chair in Social Justice and Professor in the School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Alabama. His research focuses on diversity and social justice in library and information science (LIS) and community informatics or use of information and communication technologies to empower minority and underserved populations to make meaningful changes in their everyday lives. Dr. Mehra primarily teaches courses on social justice and inclusion advocacy, diversity and inclusive leadership in information organizations, community-engaged scholarship, outreach to diverse populations, public library management, collection management, and grant development for information professionals.

Closing Session: February 22, 2024, 12:00-1:00 pm (Pacific)

Presentation Recording Link

Krishna Gadiraju-Slides

Keynote Speaker: Krishna Gadiraju, MSEE

Doctoral Candidate
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Louisiana State University

Title: Advanced AI Applications in Healthcare

Description: In the dynamic realm where Artificial Intelligence (AI) intersects with healthcare, a profound transformation unfolds, unveiling unparalleled possibilities and advancements. The fusion of advanced AI technologies with healthcare practices holds the promise to not only reshape the landscape of medical research, diagnosis, treatment, and patient care but also to set new standards for enhanced healthcare outcomes. This talk delves into the need for integrating Advanced AI applications in healthcare, recognizing the escalating complexity and challenges faced by the industry. It introduces a proactive solution rooted in graph theory to identify infectious hotspots in urban healthcare environments, constructing a patient-specific graph that adeptly captures intricate inter-dependencies and health dynamics for effective outbreak management. The subsequent discussion seamlessly aligns with the critical demand for advanced AI in healthcare, focusing on optimizing Large Language Models (LLMs). By employing graph theory and clique-finding methods to craft a prompt-specific graph, this approach aims to refine the capabilities of LLMs, enhancing their understanding of context, semantics, and domain-specific intricacies. This initiative directly contributes to the augmentation of AI tools tailored for healthcare applications. Together, these initiatives underscore the transformative potential of Advanced AI applications in healthcare. The integration of diverse patient data and the optimization of LLMs represent a strategic response to the multifaceted challenges faced by the healthcare industry. This talk endeavors to showcase these pioneering initiatives, emphasizing a unified approach that provides a tangible blueprint for the seamless integration of cutting-edge AI tools into healthcare practices.

Biography: Gadiraju received his Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering (B. Tech EEE) from JNTU Kakinada in May 2013. He then received his Post Graduate Diploma Degree from NPTI-PSTI-Bangalore, and worked as a Jr. Electrical Engineer in Elpro International Ltd. in Pune, India. He then joined Louisiana State University to pursue his master’s degree in Electrical Engineering in the spring semester of 2016. He received his degree of Master of Science in Electrical Engineering (MSEE) in Fall 2018. He is currently a doctoral candidate in electrical and computer engineering.

The College of Professional and Global Education (CPGE)’s 2023 Online Student Conference is held during February 14-17, 2023. The Conference seeks to connect students across the college and promote student work and aims to provide an opportunity for CPGE students to share their school or professional work, help students communicate and connect with each other, and ultimately foster a stronger sense of community among students.

View Student Presentations on Conference Website

All student presentations are pre-recorded video presentations housed on the conference website. Please visit this page to view the presentations and comment!

Live Opening & Closing Session

Opening Session, Feb 14, 2023, 1-2 pm Pacific

• Keynote speaker: Mike Meth, Dean of San Jose State University Library
• Recording of Live Opening Session on Zoom (Pw: @f3!&+u9)
• Slides of the Keynote Speech (shared with a CC BY-NC 4.0 license)

Mike Meth is the Dean for the SJSU Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Library. Formerly, he was the Associate Dean, Research and Learning Services at the Florida State University (FSU) Libraries. Prior to joining FSU, Michael was the Director of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education library at the University of Toronto (UofT), and before that the Director of the Li Koon Chun Finance Learning Centre, UofT Mississauga Library. While at UofT, Michael also held an appointment as adjunct faculty at the Institute for Management of Innovation at the UofT Mississauga.

Over the years, Michael has taught many graduate and undergraduate courses on a variety of topics such as leadership in libraries, finance, and on innovation (with a particular focus on the design thinking methodology). Michael has published books, chapters, articles and frequently presents on topics related to libraries including blockchain, neurodiversity, and leadership. Notable are his books “Blockchain in Libraries” (2019), and “Case Studies in Academic Library Management” (2017, co-edited).

Closing Session, Feb 17, 2023, 1-2 pm Pacific

• Keynote speaker: Dr. Luca Giancardo, Associate Professor at the Center for Precision Health, School of Biomedical Informatics, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston
• Recording of Live Closing Session on Zoom (Pw: !j@?pcQ8)
• Slides of the Keynote Speech (shared with a CC BY-NC 4.0 license)

Dr. Luca Giancardo is an Associate Professor at the Center for Precision Health, School of Biomedical Informatics (SBMI), University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) with co-appointments at the McGovern Medical School and the Institute for Stroke and Cerebrovascular Diseases, UTHealth. He is a computer scientist by training with extensive experience in image/signal analysis and machine learning applied to biomedical sciences.

His work has been applied to several biomedical applications, such as stroke diagnosis, diabetic retinopathy screening, or neurodegenerative disease tracking, and successfully translated to industry with two startups based on his methods. One, Hubble Telemedical, was acquired by Welch Allyn, another, nQ-Medical has raised significant investment. He has authored/co-authored more than 60 peer-reviewed articles which were featured by news outlets such as MIT Technology Review, Smithsonian magazine, and others. He has received multiple awards including SBMI Dean’s Excellence Award for Research and the 100k Singapore Challenge, with the judging panel uniquely composed of Nobel Prize, Turing award, and Millennium Technology Prize winners. His research and lab have been supported by competitive grants from the National Institute of Health, Translational Research Institute for Space Health, foundations, and private companies.