Work
Tools and resources I helped build
An open resource that helps educators engage critically and creatively with generative AI in the classroom. It pairs a curated library of classroom assignments, contributed by educators around the world, with interactive guides on teaching and learning with AI. Since its launch in 2023, it has reached more than 200,000 people worldwide and is recommended by over 134 colleges and universities.
A repository of open educational resources that help destigmatize failure in higher education, while equipping educators with the tools to help students embrace, learn, and bounce back from failure. The platform brings together in-class activities, syllabus templates, publications, and podcasts, alongside an annotated bibliography and a glossary of key terms.
A visualization tool that helps educators reflect on their teaching and learning practice across eight core dimensions. Built in partnership with the 2022 3M National Teaching Fellows, this project turns a reflective teaching framework into an interactive tool that educators can use to visualize their strengths and weaknesses, determine where they might need improvement, and read the literature underpinning core dimensions of teaching and learning.
On disinformation, surveillance, and design
An international research collaboration on how hybrid and neo-authoritarian empires use digital information warfare to shape opinion both at home and abroad. My contributions focused on comparative case studies of how state and non-state actors conduct information warfare through fake social media personas, government-run news agencies, and public-private partnerships in the engineering of social media platforms.
Burchell, K., Ross, J., Tolz, V., Yu, S., Amundson, J., Ding L., Forgacs, H., Kindarji, V., Korotaev, R., Markelov, M., Rodriguez, S., Scarff, S. & Zabalueva, A. with Hutchings S. and Conduit, D. (2025). Beyond Disinformation: Identarian Narratives Meet Authoritarian Practices, Lawfare & Marketcraft [Policy report]. Universities of Toronto and Manchester. https://hdl.handle.net/1807/142554
A systematic review of the legal, policy, and oversight mechanisms supporting and enabling mass surveillance programs in the United States. The paper disentangles a complex network of laws and policies, demonstrates how those mechanisms enable government surveillance programs, and explores the effectiveness of judicial oversight. Presented at the 2021 Digital Humanities Summer Institute Conference, and later published in IDEAH, the conference’s attached journal.
Rodriguez, S. (2022). The United States of Surveillance: A Review of America’s Mass Surveillance Laws, Programs, and Oversight. IDEAH: Interdisciplinary Digital Engagement in Arts & Humanities, 3(2). https://doi.org/10.21428/f1f23564.f20c77b2
Through a fellowship with the University of Toronto’s Critical Digital Humanities Initiative, I explored the historical origins of deceptive design practices. I traced how deceptive design evolved from post-WWII advertising campaigns and addictive casinos into the current design practices used to deceive, manipulate, and make consumers addicted to digital products. The findings were presented at a digital humanities conference, and used to teach over 800 undergraduate students in a course at the University of Toronto.
Rodriguez, S., Iantorno, M., & Guadagnolo, D. (2022, Oct 1). Dark Patterns: Deception and Manipulation in UX Design. Critical Digital Humanities International Conference. Toronto, ON, Canada.
Courses and learning materials on AI
A self-paced, non-technical course for postsecondary students new to AI. It covers where AI already shows up in daily life, when generative AI might be the right tool, how to check its outputs for bias or inaccuracies, and the social, environmental, and labor costs behind the technology. It also considers how people and communities can shape how it's implemented, developed, and used.
A four-day January-term design course at Harvard. Students learn about challenges facing the ocean, from coral loss to overfishing, use generative AI tools for creative ideation, and develop prototype interventions while weighing the environmental costs of both ocean degradation and AI itself.
An introductory course for city government practitioners on using AI to support municipal operations. Through real-world examples, participants learn core AI concepts, identify suitable use cases, and navigate risks around transparency, privacy, and bias. The course also covers aligning tools with organizational needs, meeting compliance requirements, engaging stakeholders, and procuring, deploying, and sustaining AI systems over time.
