You belong in this room.
AI is already deciding who gets flagged, who gets services, and who gets left behind, inside the systems social workers navigate every day. Getting those decisions right takes both the people who build these systems and the profession that understands how they land in real lives. AI governance requires co-leadership and collaboration. AI in the Room is where that work happens.
The Problem
Artificial intelligence is already making consequential decisions about the people and communities human services exists to serve. Screening tools flag families for investigation. Algorithms recommend placements, prioritize cases, and allocate resources. Predictive systems shape who gets services and who does not. The stakes could not be higher, and the pace of deployment is accelerating.
Once one of these systems is deployed in the real world, its behavior is shaped by the institutions, incentives, and people around it, which is why it cannot be governed well from any single vantage point. Getting it right takes the people who understand how these systems are built and the people who understand how they land in real lives, in the same room. That is what your participation makes possible.
AI in the Room is here to make sure that happens, and your participation is what makes it possible.
What We Are Building
AI in the Room is an initiative from Stephen Lieberman, a doctoral candidate at the University of Southern California Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work, in partnership with Dr. Marya Wright of the National Association of Social Workers, California Chapter, and anchored in the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare's Grand Challenge to Harness Technology for Social Good. Through structured Design Labs, practitioners, technologists, and organizational leaders are building a rigorous, evidence-based, adaptable, and durable foundation for AI governance in social services. That foundation is designed to inform NASW national standards and practice guidelines that stay current as the technology and the practice keep changing.
The field is right to be writing ethical guidance, and it matters. On its own it is not enough. A code of ethics can tell a practitioner what to aim for and still leave the organization around them with no accountable way to govern a system whose behavior keeps shifting after it is deployed. That gap, between good intentions and governance that actually holds, is the work. We build it with the people it affects rather than for them.
Governed well, AI can give practitioners back their time and extend what they are able to do for the people and communities they serve:
Why It Matters
Why Your Voice Is Irreplaceable
A governance framework only works when the right knowledge is built into it, and no single group holds all of it. Each of the four voices in the room sees what the others cannot, and a framework missing any one of them governs a system that does not exist.
Practitioners
You know what deployment actually does on the ground, where a tool helps, where it fails, and where it quietly reshapes the work.
Organizational Leaders
You understand the policy and institutional forces that decide whether a framework survives contact with real systems.
Community members and advocates
You know what it is to be sorted, flagged, or decided about by a tool you may never see. What you know from living that is knowledge in its own right, and governance that leaves it out fails the people who need it most.
AI researchers and technologists
You know how these systems work inside, what they can do, what they cannot, and where they break. That knowledge is why the room is not complete without you.
Whether AI becomes a tool for equity or another mechanism for harm will not be settled by technology alone. It depends on work like this, and on people like you choosing to be a part of it.
Apply to ParticipateThe Team
About the Team
Stephen Lieberman
DSW Candidate, USC · President, NASW Southern California Caucus · Founder, 1023.ai
Stephen Lieberman is a DSW candidate at the USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work, President of the NASW Southern California Caucus, and President of the Phi Alpha Honor Society, Omicron Epsilon Chapter. He brings more than 20 years of leadership in AI, technology, and social innovation across nonprofit, government, industry, and academic sectors, including senior roles at Northrop Grumman and the Naval Postgraduate School, where he served as a Principal Investigator for multiyear social technology research and development programs.
Dr. Marya Wright, DSW, LCSW
External Design Partner · President-Elect, NASW California
Dr. Marya Wright, DSW, LCSW is the President-Elect of NASW California, a USC DSW alumna, Phi Alpha leader, and a published researcher on algorithmic decision-making in child welfare. She is a nationally recognized social work educator, consultant, and forensic social worker. She serves as External Design Partner for this initiative, bringing deep domain expertise and the institutional knowledge to carry the design work forward into professional practice and national policy.
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Join AI in the Room
AI in the Room is building a community of social workers, AI researchers, nonprofit leaders, policymakers, and community members to collaboratively shape responsible AI in social services. Through structured Design Labs and ongoing collaboration, participants will help inform the development of a Framework for Responsible AI in Social Services. Interest does not obligate participation, and all inquiries are confidential. We will respond personally to every inquiry.
AI is already reshaping social services. Whether it does that well depends on who is in the room when the decisions get made. You belong there, and this work needs you. We want to hear from you.
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