2026 ALISE Annual Conference

This work-in-progress examines the "good questions" AI forces educators, librarians, and information professionals to confront. Drawing on situated cognition, Gee's framework for meaning-making, and emerging scholarship on epistemic authority, this project develops a framework for critical AI engagement through workshops employing empathy mapping, equity-centered design sprints, and guided reflection. Three categories of questions emerge: epistemological (how knowledge is constructed when AI positions itself as knower), pedagogical (how to preserve productive struggle when AI bypasses sense-making), and ethical (who participates in AI decisions). The rise of agentic AI intensifies all three, demanding guiding principles rooted in empathy, equity, and learner agency.