Presentation Schedule
From Ambient Algorithms to Autonomous Agents: A Diagnostic for Institutional AI Strategy (110282)
Session Chair: Dale Pike
Saturday, 11 July 2026 09:15
Session: Session 1
Room: UCL Torrington, G09 (Ground Floor)
Presentation Type:Workshop Presentation
Most higher education institutions make consequential decisions about AI policy, training, governance, and assessment using an undifferentiated concept of "AI use." This undifferentiation produces predictable failures: blanket policies that constrain experienced users while inadequately guiding novices, training programs that teach prompting skills to people who need workflow design, and assessment approaches focused on detection rather than design.
This workshop introduces a framework that distinguishes five qualitatively distinct modes of human-AI interaction, ordered by the degree of human agency in the relationship: Ambient (AI acts without awareness), Transactional (single-shot query and response), Iterative (multi-turn refinement), Procedural (human-designed repeatable workflows), and Autonomous (AI acts within human-defined boundaries). A cross-cutting capability, Judgment, operates along two dimensions: technical judgment (assessing AI's reliability and fit) and human impact judgment (assessing what AI use does to the user, to others, and to the capabilities that matter over time).
Participants will map their own institutional contexts to the framework, identifying where their policies, training, and assessment designs address some modes but leave others unexamined. The workshop will use structured exercises to surface the specific gaps, particularly around ambient AI already embedded in institutional systems and the emerging challenge of autonomous AI agents.
The framework was developed through institutional practice at a major US research university and draws on existing scholarship in AI literacy, skill acquisition, and technology adoption. Participants will leave with a diagnostic tool applicable to their own institutional strategies.
Authors:
Dale Pike, Virginia Tech, United States
About the Presenter(s)
Mr Dale Pike is a School Administrator at Virginia Tech in United States
Connect on Linkedin
https://www.linkedin.com/in/dalepike/
See this presentation on the full schedule – Saturday Schedule
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