The Change We Work: Professional Agency and Ethics for Emerging AI Technologies

Early hype cycles surrounding new technologies may promote simplistic binary options of either adoption or rejection, but socio-historical analyses of technologies illuminate how they are worked into shape by human actors. Humans enact agency through many choices that result in adaptations and contextual variations. In this piece, we argue that the changes that result from emerging technologies are the ones that we work into shape through professional methods, artistry, and effort. We draw on historical and contemporary examples such as writing and learning analytics to illustrate this shaping cycle and apply ethical analysis to identify potential harms and benefits of emerging AI technologies that then inform learning design decisions. We conclude with an example of the application of "cognitive partnerships" as some of the important theory building that is part of the professional work still to be done in working AI - or any emerging technology - towards the change we desire.