Seminars & Tours

“Delivering a World-Class Customer Experience: Lessons from the Mouse” 
Presented by Danny Snow.

In a world overflowing with options, standing out requires more than just good products or services. It demands an exceptional customer experience that builds loyalty and drives results. 
Customers today value what sets you apart; what you can deliver that others won't or can't. Creating that unique value is how you win hearts and retain business. Drawing from his Disney heritage and extensive experience in the family business, Danny Snow offers a fresh perspective on delivering service excellence.
This program equips leaders and teams with actionable strategies to elevate every interaction, turning ordinary customer moments into extraordinary loyalty-building experiences.

Participants will learn:

• Insights into shifting employees from a task-oriented mindset to an experience-focused approach.
• Tools to ensure your "backstage" operations enhance and never disrupt your "onstage" customer experience.
• Practical techniques to consistently exceed customer expectations and leave lasting impressions.
• A customer-centric process for designing systems and workflows that anticipate and meet customer needs.

"Lower Access Barriers from the Back End to the End User" 
Presented by Thomas J. Tobin

Many people know the universal design for learning (UDL) framework as a way to reduce access barriers for college and university students in the classroom. UDL can also help us to improve organizing and strategic planning skills to reduce rework, barriers, and confusion in the workplace.
With more professionals from different backgrounds joining the higher-education IT workforce, there is a growing need to work efficiently and effectively to support campus initiatives. The UDL framework provides an evidence-based set of approaches, informed by the neuroscience of how humans learn and interact, to make our IT work more agile, responsive, and predictive.
I identified over 300 information-technology job titles at two large Research-1 universities and interviewed a representative sample from more than 15 conceptual clusters to identify the job duties in which IT professionals and instructors need to engage peers, share information, and practice with new ideas and concepts—the very elements that UDL helps to make smoother and more efficient.
Come to this session and learn how to apply the principles of the UDL framework to the IT and instructor workforce in order to reduce errors, speed professional learning, and increase productivity, teamwork, and student satisfaction. By attending this session, you will:

1. encounter two cases for assessing access gaps among IT units and roles;
2. improve efficiency by building connections, collaboration, and communication among IT professionals and instructors; and
3. apply the UDL framework within your administrative context to lower workflow barriers.

Beyond Experimentation: Thinking About AI’s Next Chapter on Our Campuses
Presented by: David Weil, Senior Vice President for Strategic Services and Initiatives / CIO, Ithaca College

Over the past few years, higher education has moved from curiosity and experimentation with AI to early impact. As we look ahead, how do we build on this momentum toward more intentional, values-aligned uses that support the full student experience? We will look at examples such as moving beyond point solutions toward a more longitudinal view of the student journey, clarifying how we think about value and impact, and making more intentional choices about where to invest limited time, attention, and resources.

This session examines key considerations shaping the next chapter of AI on our campuses, drawing on lessons from recent exploration and helping to frame strategies and direction for the work ahead.

“Building AI Literacy with Intention, Ethics, and Humanity” 
Presented by Dr. Rachelle Dené Poth

When AI first entered our classrooms, educators worried about cheating, plagiarism, and whether it belonged in schools at all. Now, that conversation has shifted. AI is becoming part of everyday learning, and educators are asking more intentional questions: How does AI support learning goals? When does it enhance thinking, and when does it replace it? How do we keep students and ourselves safe?

This session explores how AI in education has moved from fear and avoidance to purposeful, responsible integration. Participants will discuss key considerations, including data privacy, ethical use, age-appropriate access, transparency over surveillance, and the importance of building skills rather than replacing learning opportunities. The session also highlights why AI literacy must include human skills such as judgment, empathy, reflection, and discernment, as well as focusing on digital citizenship and digital wellness.

"Learning and working with AI: Thinking still required"
Presented by Joan Monahan Watson, Ph.D.

Using AI as an assistant to make cognition explicit and strengthen critical thinking

As generative AI becomes increasingly present in classrooms and workplaces, educators and professionals often feel caught between reactive policies and tool-focused adoption. This session invites a different conversation, one centered on how AI can be used strategically to support learning rather than replace thinking.

Drawing on ideas from Learning with AI: The K–12 Teacher’s Guide to a New Era of Human Learning, this session explores using AI as an assistant who is capable of bringing the learning process into the open. When AI is used to generate drafts, offer explanations, or assert alternative arguments, learners have opportunities to examine, question, and revise their own thinking in individualized contexts. This makes it easier for learners to reflect on how they reason, recognize gaps in their understanding, and develop stronger judgment and more complete ways of knowing over time.

Through guided reflection and discussion, participants from K–12 education, higher education, and professional settings will explore practical, human-centered approaches to using AI in ways that preserve human agency, accountability, and ethical responsibility. The session emphasizes that AI strengthens learning not by doing the thinking for us, but by making human thinking examinable, revisable, and accountable.

Bridging the Gap with Personalized AI & STEM Capable Note Taking
Presented by Jennifer Sponer, Jamworks

Jamworks uses AI in a responsible way to improve access to learning and provide personalized note taking support that is fully capable of handling even the most complex STEM classes!

Because every student learns differently, Jamworks provides a variety of different ways to support note taking and learning. We will outline how the platform can be configured to provide just the right level of support to individual students.
From personalized suggestions to improve students’ own typed or handwritten notes, to full professional grade provided notes and audio chapters, Jamworks is a flexible learning platform built with accessibility and personalization in mind.

Jamworks supports disabled students to record lectures, attach slides, take notes and mark highlights. It works online and offline, fully supports STEM and provides personalized note improvement suggestions — students even get their very own personal tutor to explain difficult concepts and create interactive quizzes.

Liberty AV Classroom Solutions - "Simple to Complex" 
Presented by: Tom O'Hanlon, Wesco

Liberty AV provides a full ecosystem of audiovisual, connectivity, control, and AVoIP technologies designed specifically for modern educational environments—from K12 classrooms to higher education lecture halls. Education institutions need solutions that are easy to use, install and maintain and deliver products with clear audio and video, fast and reliable data transmission, and robust security and protection. Our solutions incorporate the latest technologies and features and can be tailored to fit any specific requirement or preference. Liberty A/V, security, and connectivity products are interoperable, flexible,

Solutions:

AVoIP 6000 Series

• 10Gbps SDVoE-based video transport
• Zero-latency 4K60 4:4:4 HDMI
• Draganddrop configuration via Arranger software
• Supports multiview, ideal for simulation labs or esports classrooms
• USB over IP

DigitaLinx:

• HDMI autoswitchers such as DLS41H2
• HDBaseT signal extenders, USB-C
• Scalers, converters, DA’s, splitters

The Ghost Student Epidemic
Presented by: Tom Robinson, Fortinet 

Higher education institutions are facing a rapidly escalating wave of organized financial-aid fraud driven by gaps in digital identity, automation controls, and verification of workflows. Fraud rings, often operating at national or international scale, massproduce synthetic or stolen identities using compromised personal data, disposable communication channels, and automated tooling. These “ghost students” are then funneled through admissions pipelines at open-enrollment colleges using bots capable of completing applications, residency forms, and FAFSA workflows with high volume and minimal human oversight.  Learn more about this issue and some ways your institution can protect yourselves against it.

AI in Higher Education: The Student Perspective (2026 Update)
Presented by: Casey Kendall & Ithaca College Students 

Student use of AI has shifted from experimentation to everyday practice. From brainstorming and tutoring to coding, research, and creative work, generative AI is now embedded in how many students learn. 

This session centers student voices to explore how their relationship with AI has evolved. Students will share where AI is genuinely helping them learn, where it creates new challenges, and how course design, expectations, and guidance are shaping their decisions and use of AI. 

Small Team, Big Impact: Agentic AI as a Development Accelerator and Problem-Solving Partner
Presented by: Rob Snyder, Ithaca College

Most campus IT teams are sitting on years of data work — integrations, queries, institutional knowledge — that's underutilized because there's never been enough time or staff to build on top of it. Agentic AI changes that math. This session uses examples from Ithaca College to show how we used agentic AI to layer new capabilities onto existing institutional data. We'll get technical about how agentic AI accelerated the build, and honest about where it didn't. But the point isn't what we built — it's the approach. We'll focus on what's transferable: finding high-value problems hiding in your existing infrastructure, scoping AI-accelerated projects realistically, and rethinking what a small team can deliver when agentic AI is part of the process. 

iFisher: Next Generation Learning Initiative
Presented by: Chris Plantone, St. John Fisher University

This session will share the story of St. John Fisher University and how a 1:1 Apple iPad program sparked a transformative shift in teaching and learning. The presentation traces the evolution of the iFisher Initiative—from its visionary beginnings to its full-scale implementation—highlighting the innovative strategies that have reshaped educational practice across campus.
Participants will explore the cutting‑edge technologies, pedagogical advancements, and collaborative efforts driving our success, and discover how the initiative continues to enrich the classroom experience, foster faculty innovation, and prepare students for the demands of the future.

Amazon Expectations vs. Campus Reality: Closing the Gap with Data-Driven Solutions
Presented by: Allison Dean, Pathify and Casey Kendall, Ithaca College 

Today's students expect Netflix-level personalization and Amazon-style convenience — seamless, customized and mobile-first. But, more than half say their institution's digital experience doesn't measure up. This gap isn't just frustrating; it's costly. Pathify’s 2025 Student Digital Experience Survey reveals that 47% have missed critical deadlines due to fragmented systems and 32% would reconsider their college choice based solely on digital experience. This session presents eye-opening data on the widening "experience gap" between student expectations and institutional reality, then explores how institutions are addressing this challenge through Campus Experience Platforms (CXPs).

Ithaca College will share its student-first approach to addressing the experience gap by prioritizing data visibility, particularly for first-year students. Ithaca focused on bringing key student-facing data—previously spread across multiple systems—into a single, more understandable view that helps students orient themselves and understand what requires attention. In this model, Pathify functions as a dashboard and set of “driving instruments,” providing clarity without replacing underlying systems.

The session will also discuss how Campus Experience Platforms can support this phased approach of improving transparency for students, reducing cognitive load, and establishing a foundation that institutions can build on as governance, readiness, and platform capabilities evolve. Attendees will leave with practical guidance on scoping responsibly, aligning technology use to platform maturity, and improving the student experience through clearer, data-informed design.

When the Network Falls Silent: Building Cyber‑Resilient Schools from the Data Up
Presented by: Bobby Flanagan, Dell Technologies 

Ransomware and cyberattacks on schools and universities are no longer “if,” but “when.” When systems go dark, the impact is immediate: canceled classes, frozen payroll, delayed research, and shaken community trust. This session explores how K‑12 districts and higher education institutions can build true cyber resilience by starting with the most critical asset they own—their data. We’ll walk through how modern data protection—immutable backups, logically and physically isolated cyber vaults, and orchestrated recovery—keeps learning and operations running, even on your worst day.