Alexandra Shelton
LightNews LightNews
alexandrashelton.bsky.social
Alexandra Shelton
@alexandrashelton.bsky.social
1.1K followers 560 following 11 posts
Assistant prof of special education at JHU / Researching literacy for students at the intersections of dis/ability and socioculturally marginalized identities / Wife / Mom of 3 / she/her 💕💚
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
olivia.science
Finally! 🤩 Our position piece: Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia:
doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

We unpick the tech industry’s marketing, hype, & harm; and we argue for safeguarding higher education, critical
thinking, expertise, academic freedom, & scientific integrity.
1/n
Abstract: Under the banner of progress, products have been uncritically adopted or even imposed on users — in past centuries with tobacco and combustion engines, and in the 21st with social media. For these collective blunders, we now regret our involvement or apathy as scientists, and society struggles to put the genie back in the bottle. Currently, we are similarly entangled with artificial intelligence (AI) technology. For example, software updates are rolled out seamlessly and non-consensually, Microsoft Office is bundled with chatbots, and we, our students, and our employers have had no say, as it is not considered a valid position to reject AI technologies in our teaching and research. This is why in June 2025, we co-authored an Open Letter calling on our employers to reverse and rethink their stance on uncritically adopting AI technologies. In this position piece, we expound on why universities must take their role seriously toa) counter the technology industry’s marketing, hype, and harm; and to b) safeguard higher education, critical thinking, expertise, academic freedom, and scientific integrity. We include pointers to relevant work to further inform our colleagues. Figure 1. A cartoon set theoretic view on various terms (see Table 1) used when discussing the superset AI (black outline, hatched background): LLMs are in orange; ANNs are in magenta; generative models are in blue; and finally, chatbots are in green. Where these intersect, the colours reflect that, e.g. generative adversarial network (GAN) and Boltzmann machine (BM) models are in the purple subset because they are both generative and ANNs. In the case of proprietary closed source models, e.g. OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Apple’s Siri, we cannot verify their implementation and so academics can only make educated guesses (cf. Dingemanse 2025). Undefined terms used above: BERT (Devlin et al. 2019); AlexNet (Krizhevsky et al. 2017); A.L.I.C.E. (Wallace 2009); ELIZA (Weizenbaum 1966); Jabberwacky (Twist 2003); linear discriminant analysis (LDA); quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA). Table 1. Below some of the typical terminological disarray is untangled. Importantly, none of these terms are orthogonal nor do they exclusively pick out the types of products we may wish to critique or proscribe. Protecting the Ecosystem of Human Knowledge: Five Principles
September 6, 2025 at 8:13 AM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
wolvendamien.bsky.social
Louisiana has to build three new natural gas power plants to accommodate the "AI" data center that Meta just crammed through because said center will use *Three Times* as much electricity (and, thus, attendant resources) as the *Entire City Of New Orleans*, every year.

Y'all this isn't sustainable.
La. regulators approve Entergy power plants for Meta’s AI data center
Louisiana Public Service Commissioners voted four to one to approve Entergy’s three new gas plants to power Meta’s largest-ever data center.
www.kplctv.com
August 22, 2025 at 5:15 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
mansthulin.bsky.social
Thanks for the kind words Martin! Anyone interested can find the open access book at modernstatisticswithr.com and/or get physical copies where books are sold (the second edition, published by Chapman & Hall last year, has a different cover than the first edition seen in the image).
February 19, 2025 at 11:37 AM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
carajackson.bsky.social
All practice guides are in the public domain.

Just in case...
osf.io/dk4r5/
February 11, 2025 at 1:00 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
dataangler.bsky.social
This person has been pulling down gobs of stuff from NCES

mastodon.online/@vwbusguy/11...
Scott Williams 🐧 (@[email protected])
We've been collecting and mirroring what we can find of public data scrapes of data that has recently gone missing from federal sites or is likely to in the near future. The repos here include public...
mastodon.online
February 11, 2025 at 2:47 AM
alexandrashelton.bsky.social
Love this idea. 2025 goals
December 6, 2024 at 4:09 AM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
kevinwongla.bsky.social
📣 I am excited to co-edit a book w/ Fabrice Jaumont on embracing the imperfection of language learning. Do you have a story, a case study, a biography that challenges the paralyzing "gold standard" of achieving native-like fluency in an L2? For submission guidelines, visit
calec.org/2024/11/28/b...
Beyond Perfection: The Beauty of Imperfect Language Learning
Call for Papers Edited by Kevin M. Wong, PhD, and Fabrice Jaumont, PhD The Center for the Advancement of Languages, Education, and Communities invites submissions for an edited volume exploring the…
calec.org
December 3, 2024 at 6:12 AM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
chiarapau.bsky.social
#ELT #languages
November 20, 2024 at 7:28 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
mskellymhayes.bsky.social
Around this time every year, I share a list of ways to support Native people. From supporting Indigenous people seeking abortion care to defending Native voting rights and keeping Native families together, here are some causes worth supporting. 🧵
November 28, 2024 at 1:51 AM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
estherlindstrom.bsky.social
🔥NEW ARTICLE🔥
I LOVE observation research and thinking about how to do it well. @kimberlymcfadden.bsky.social & I wrote about its importance for improving outcomes for students with IDD and some things we've learned along the way. 1/

Available open access in JARID: dx.doi.org/10.1111/jar....
Leveraging Observation Research to Improve Instruction for Students With Intellectual Disability: Guidance forAdapting Tools. Esther R. Lindström | Kimberly A. McFadden. University of Illinois Chicago. Lehigh University. ABSTRACT. Background and Aims: Students with intellectual disability benefit from high-quality instruction in reading and mathematics. Methods: This Theoretical Paper outlines the need for effective, evidence-based instructional practices for this population and the potential for observation research to inform such advancements. We report our systematic process of adapting two widely used observation tools initially developed for students with learning disabilities, to address content and instructional practices relevant to classrooms serving elementary students with intellectual disability. Results: Our revised observation tools facilitated more inclusive data collection, taking into account the needs and goals of students with intellectual disability, in addition to their peers for whom the original tool was designed. Conclusions: We offer guidance for researchers and practitioners to make similar adaptations when using research tools in-tended for other populations or instructional settings.
November 21, 2024 at 3:58 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
profkateseltzer.bsky.social
Excited to share this just 1 day before I leave for #NCTE24! Cati and I were honored to write the intro to the special issue of English Journal titled “Decentering the E in ELA”. 🤩 Lmk if you need access. Hope to see some of you in Boston!
November 19, 2024 at 10:35 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
bethanyusher.bsky.social
Remember folks that we need to return to the old habit of reposting (retweeting) people's posts instead of liking them to allow the folks we think are cool to build their following. Let's continue to build one another's visibility as a community should.
November 19, 2024 at 6:18 AM
alexandrashelton.bsky.social
A great article for kids (and adults!)
aalcorn.bsky.social Alyssa Alcorn @aalcorn.bsky.social · Nov 13
🥳 Check out our new article introducing neurodiversity research--for kids!
Frontiers For Young Minds is a peer-reviewed scientific journal for kids, with young reviewers (+ adults). With @cjcrompton.bsky.social @katiecebula.bsky.social @suereviews.bsky.social
kids.frontiersin.org/articles/10....
kids.frontiersin.org
November 19, 2024 at 11:54 AM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
ebthen.bsky.social
Alt text prompt Qs:

What would someone who can't see the image need to know about it in order to take part in the conversation? What is it about this image that made you choose it? What are the important details someone who could see the image would take away from it?

(Not for images of text.)
May 20, 2024 at 6:16 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
doriec.bsky.social
I just scrolled #EduSky for a few minutes and counted how many images used alt text vs those that did not.

Only 17 images had alt text whereas 36 did not. This means our community is not accessible to blind users or others who use screen readers.

We have a lot of room for improvement. 🧵
November 17, 2024 at 3:45 PM
alexandrashelton.bsky.social
Hi! Just wanted to introduce myself. I’m a special ed prof primarily interested in literacy for multiply marginalized students with dis/abilities. I spend most of my free time with family, watching TV, or reading. Happy to see both new and familiar faces over here and hoping to post more!
November 17, 2024 at 11:07 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
izzyfox.bsky.social
PSA for newbies:

Please include ALT text on your images.

This is an inclusive space for blind and visually impaired people.

Don't arrive late to the party and ignore a bunch of people.

Also, please share this skeet, rather than liking it, to ensure the message gets delivered.

Thanks!
November 16, 2024 at 12:18 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
shaonta.bsky.social
Created this starter pack yesterday.. who else do I need to add?? Share and tag your faves!! #AcademicSky #BlackSky
go.bsky.app/H4CUfnL
November 15, 2024 at 5:55 PM
Reposted by Alexandra Shelton
grodriguezlemus.bsky.social
Community for Education Scholars in all areas and concentrations looking to find each other!
Please reply to this post if you want to be added!! #EducationScholars

go.bsky.app/BaXvoap
November 14, 2024 at 7:02 AM
alexandrashelton.bsky.social
If you see this, please repost with a favorite photo of the sky that you’ve taken recently
Blue sky and blue water with a bridge in the backdrop, a water fountain with people sitting in lawn chairs in a green space lined by trees
November 16, 2024 at 1:58 AM