Best Speakers on AI and Teens for Schools

Co-founder and CEO of AI for Education

Bickerstaff is a former high school biology teacher and education technology executive with more than 20 years in the sector. Through AI for Education she runs workshops and professional learning across K-12 and higher education, with an emphasis on AI literacy, ethical adoption, and reducing teacher workload. She is one of the more frequently booked voices on what generative AI actually looks like in a classroom.

Her organization offers workshops and seminars for staff, a GenAI safety workshop for schools working through risk and policy, and keynotes and panels for conferences. Sessions lean toward hands-on practice rather than overview.

AI for Education also publishes a large body of free material, including a prompt library and a resource hub, which gives a school a clear sense of the approach before committing to anything.

Best for in-service days and faculty training where teachers want hands-on practice rather than an overview.

aiforeducation.io

Teacher-librarian and author, Ontario, Canada

Casa-Todd is the author of Social LEADia and Raising Digital Leaders, holds a master's degree in education and digital technologies, and received the ISTE Digital Citizenship Network Award in 2020. She was nominated for the Prime Minister's Award for Teaching Excellence in 2024. Her background is in classroom teaching and literacy consulting rather than research or industry.

Her focus is on moving students from digital citizenship toward digital leadership, and her more recent work covers AI literacy alongside media literacy and student voice. She delivers keynotes and workshops for districts, schools, and community audiences, and has presented for ISTE, TCEA, FETC, and MassCUE.

Her books and her blog, where she writes about testing AI outputs with students and about AI literacy frameworks, show the level she pitches at. Her classroom experience tends to show in how concrete her sessions are.

Best for student leadership groups and schools that want teens involved in shaping the AI conversation rather than only hearing about it.

jcasatodd.com

Author and speaker, founder of Raising Digital Natives

Heitner holds a Ph.D. in media, technology, and society from Northwestern University and has taught at Northwestern and DePaul. She is the author of Growing Up in Public, a national bestseller, and Screenwise, and her writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and CNN Opinion.

Her argument, which she applies to AI as readily as to social media, is that mentoring works better than monitoring, and that teens are often already thinking critically about these tools. She has presented at SXSW EDU, TEDx, NAIS, and ISTE, and her speaking work covers student, parent, and faculty audiences.

Beyond sessions, she works with schools and nonprofits on digital wellness and AI policy, and she writes regularly for families on her blog. Her background page sets out the research behind the approach.

Best for parent evenings and independent school communities where the concern is privacy, reputation, and how much supervision is appropriate.

devorahheitner.com

Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Florida Atlantic University, and Co-Director of the Cyberbullying Research Center

Hinduja has studied youth and technology for the last 20 years, and his recent work covers generative AI, conversational chatbots, AI-facilitated harassment, and deepfakes. He has written more than 70 peer-reviewed articles and nine books, has approximately 30,000 citations to his research, and appears in the Stanford and Elsevier ranking of the world's top 2% of scientists.

He is also a faculty associate at the Berkman Klein Center at Harvard University, has advised two White House administrations on youth online safety, and serves on Meta's AI advisory board. His research summaries are public, so a school can read the underlying work before booking.

He has delivered more than 600 keynotes and trainings, and his AI session, Youth, Generative AI, and Social Chatbots, covers what the research can inform and what it cannot. Separate sessions are available for parents and guardians and for faculty professional development.

Best for schools that want the AI conversation grounded in peer-reviewed research rather than headlines, and districts stacking a student assembly, a parent evening, and staff training into one visit.

hinduja.org

Educator, consultant, and author

Shelton is the co-author of The Promises and Perils of AI in Education and has spent more than two decades in education technology, learning design, and leadership development, much of it teaching at the middle school level. He holds a master's degree in education with a focus on educational technology and new media design.

He served on a California State Superintendent's Education Technology Task Force and advises districts and ministries of education on AI policy development and professional learning plans. Equity and media literacy run through most of his work, and he is an Apple Distinguished Educator, a Google Certified Innovator, and a Microsoft Innovative Educator Expert.

His keynotes, workshops, and consulting cover organizational leadership, policy analysis, inclusive learning environments, and media literacy alongside AI. He writes on the subject at Mindful Musings, and his book page sets out his position on AI in schools.

Best for district leadership teams writing AI policy, and educator conferences that need a keynote on responsible adoption.

kennethshelton.net