Portraits of Impact
Nishanshi Shukla
AI Researcher Funded By Fellowship Program
Nishanshi Shukla PhD’25 loved her time teaching at The University of Texas at Dallas. As part of her doctoral program in arts, technology and emerging communication, she was required to work as a teaching assistant. She was so successful, her work earned her a Dean’s Teaching Fellowship in the Harry W. Bass Jr. School of Arts, Humanities, and Technology.
“My first year at UTD, I was a research assistant, and from the second year onwards, I’ve been a teaching assistant that has worked my way up to being an instructor of record,” Shukla said. “When I received the fellowship, I was allowed to design my own course, which was an enriching experience that I really enjoyed.”
The fellowship provides recipients with an increased TA stipend and necessary research funds.
For Shukla, the extra funding allowed her to move out of a room shared with a roommate and into her own space. Doing so gave her the space to focus her attention solely on her dissertation.
“The extra money was so helpful to me,” Shukla said. “In addition to moving out, it also enabled me to not worry as much about budgeting, which freed up a lot of time for me to focus on my work and teaching. Additionally, it covered some emergency medical bills. I had to have all four wisdom teeth extracted, and I did not have to worry about the cost because I was covered by the University.”
The research funding that came with the fellowship was crucial for her. She is a socio-technical researcher who looks at making AI more responsible.
“Responsible AI is made with accountability in mind,” Shukla said. “It’s not policies or compliance that makes it responsible, as some may assume, rather I look at what powers and politics are at play with these systems. I ask, ‘How are these systems operating?’ and ‘Who and what they are including and excluding?’ I also look at how the user is perceived by generative AI systems and who are the people training these AI models.”
Her research emphasizes that generative AI systems, like ChatGPT, are not without bias.
“The answers these systems give us are often not black and white,” Shukla said. “There are people involved behind the scenes teaching AI the answers that the user gets. Those people have cultural influences and biases that may interfere with the objectivity that is assumed with AI systems. To me, it is important to understand that when AI is talking to us, it cannot assume that both a businessman and a farmer have the same lived experiences.”
When false or partially true information is shared by different AI systems, it presents a new set of problems.
“AI distributing information that is not fully truthful creates problems in the world,” Shukla said. “We’ve all seen the problems that happened with false information on social media. If the same false or partial information is being shared by different AI systems, it can lead to people treating others differently based on the stereotypes. Then it becomes about discrimination, and I think it is important to be able to understand what is true and what is not.”
Political Economy of Digital Media — the course she taught as part of the fellowship — touched on these issues. In total, Shukla taught about 250 students during her time at UTD.
“Teaching was a fun experience,” Shukla said. “As a teaching assistant, you are also learning the topic more, but from a different lens than as a student. It was quite enjoyable to see things this way. We did mostly discussion-based, student-centric courses so I’d teach them something, give them questions and activities and then let the students come up with their answers or discuss their varying perspectives.”
Oftentimes, receiving financial aid is a validating experience for students. Receiving a Dean’s Teaching Fellowship gave Shukla a sense of confidence in both her research and her teaching abilities. The validation has also given her the confidence to actively pursue AI-related jobs.
“I really want to work in the field of responsible AI and bring a different perspective from critical media studies into the field of technology,” Shukla said. “In summer 2024, I worked on a team at IBM called the Inclusive and Responsible Technology Team. I see myself doing something in that field, working to make AI better.”