Overview:
The MIT Critical Data, Institute for Medical Engineering and Science, and Priscilla King Gray (PKG) Public Service Center’s AI, Health Equity, and Ethics Symposium explores the theme of epistemic humility, cultural humility, and diverse perspectives, alongside meaningful community involvement, to transform the way we think, learn, and collaborate to prevent AI from perpetuating existing disparities. Opening with a keynote by Dr. Tereza Hendl, a philosopher and bioethicist, the event explores broad ethical frameworks and specific challenges, such as the limitations of AI and bias. Workshops will focus on bias mitigation strategies co-designed with marginalized communities, emphasizing participatory action research to democratize innovation and promote just healthcare outcomes. By centering community expertise and lived experiences, the symposium encourages a reimagining of AI’s role in healthcare—ensuring that technological advances work to reduce, not reinforce, disparities.
Event Details:
Date: Thursday, January 16th, 2025
Time: 10:00 AM – 3:30 PM
Location: MIT E90-1201 (1 Main St)
Agenda:
| 9:30 AM | Event Registration & Networking |
| 10:00 AM | Keynote by Tereza Hendl |
| 11:00 AM | Break |
| 11:15 AM | Talk by Amy Moran-Thomas (via Zoom) |
| 12:00 PM | Lunch, Discussion Facilitated by Katia Powell-Laurent |
| 1:00 PM | AI and Healthy Equity Panel |
| 2:00 PM | Break |
| 2:15 PM | Workshops on AI, Health Equity, and Ethics |
| 3:00 PM | Call to Action and Closing Remarks |
Featured Speakers:
| Keynote Speaker: Dr. Tereza Hendl  | Tereza is a philosopher and bioethicist, currently working as a Co2libri Visiting Fellow at Humboldt University of Berlin and Associated Researcher at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Her research investigates concerns of vulnerability, refusal, empowerment, justice and solidarity, and the ethics and epistemology of health technologies and interventions. She is currently editing the book mHealth: Intersectional Ethics for a Global Society to be published with Oxford University Press. She is the co-founder of the RUTA Association for Central, South, and Eastern Europe, Baltic, Caucasus, Central and Northern Asia Studies in Global Conversation. |
| Panelist: Dr. Marzyeh Ghassemi  | Dr. Marzyeh Ghassemi is an Associate Professor at MIT in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) and Institute for Medical Engineering & Science (IMES). She holds MIT affiliations with the Jameel Clinic, LIDS, IDSS, and CSAIL. For examples of short- and long-form talks Professor Ghassemi has given, see her Forbes lightning talk, and her ICML keynote. Professor Ghassemi holds a Germeshausen Career Development Professorship, and was named a CIFAR Azrieli Global Scholar and one of MIT Tech Review’s 35 Innovators Under 35. In 2024, she received an NSF CAREER award, and Google Research Scholar Award. Prior to her PhD in Computer Science at MIT, she received an MSc. degree in biomedical engineering from Oxford University as a Marshall Scholar, and B.S. degrees in computer science and electrical engineering as a Goldwater Scholar at New Mexico State University.Professor Ghassemi work spans computer science and clinical venues, including NeurIPS, KDD, AAAI, MLHC, JAMIA, JMIR, JMLR, AMIA-CRI, Nature Medicine, Nature Translational Psychiatry, and Critical Care. Her work has been featured in popular press such as MIT News, The Boston Globe, and The Huffington Post. |
| Panelist: Leo Anthony Celi, MD, MPH, MSc  | Leo is the principal investigator behind the Medical Information Mart for Intensive Care (MIMIC) and its offsprings, MIMIC-CXR, MIMIC-ED, MIMIC-ECHO, and MIMIC-ECG. With close to 100k users worldwide, an open codebase, and close to 10k publications in Google Scholar, the datasets have undoubtedly shaped the course of machine learning in healthcare in the United States and beyond. In partnership with hospitals, universities and professional societies across the globe, Leo and his team have organized over 50 datathons in 22 countries, bringing together students, clinicians, researchers, and engineers to leverage data routinely collected in the process of care. |
| Panelist: Hector Acevedo  | Hector was born in El Salvador and diagnosed with a rare form of Spondyloepiphyseal Dysplasia, a congenital disorder that affects the skeleton and presents significant health challenges. Due to limited medical resources available at the time, Hector and his mother Amanda moved to Cambridge, MA, in search of better medical care and opportunities for a better life. Hector attended Hamilton College as a member of The Posse Foundation, merit-based leadership scholarship that recognizes the potential of students from inner cities, often overlooked by small liberal arts colleges. He graduated in 2008 with a degree in Women’s Studies and Education. As a proud son of Cambridge with Salvadoran roots, his commitment to community service extends to his roles on various non-profit boards and committees. Hector is dedicated to “changing the way change happens” and continues to create civic engagement and employment opportunities for Cambridge residents. |
| Facilitator: Katia Powell-Laurent  | Katia Powell-Laurent is an award-winning nutrition and wellness expert, a practicing Holistic Nutritionist, Birth Doula, Maternal Health Researcher, Childbirth Educator (CBE) Trainee, and Lactation Counselor. She’s a distinguished member of the MIT linQ Faculty, a Servant Leader at the Greater Boston Birth Equity Coalition, and a Co-Lead Member of the Massachusetts Doula Coalition. She is the founder of HUED Mamas co. (dba Black Girls Nutrition) – the first digital nutrition company that recognizes the unique health challenges faced by Women of the Black Diaspora, she has developed culturally competent, comprehensive nutrition solutions. BGN offers tailored nutrition guidance to women at every life stage, from overall wellness to reproductive health. She is revolutionizing reproductive health with her innovative nutrition app that addresses the unique infertility challenges faced by Black women, including often unspoken inequities in reproductive health. From preconception to postpartum and beyond, HUED Mamas Co. aims to improve maternal health outcomes and fertility, breaking down barriers of guilt and shame often associated with Black Fertility issues. To date, Katia has helped her current and past clients lose over 100,000 lbs. She has been featured in Essence Magazine, Boston Business Journal, is a Robert Woods Johnson Scholar, completed five years of doctoral studies in nutrition/health policy and has 25+ years of expertise in nutrition, maternal health, health equity, food justice, public health and medicine. |
Irene Dankwa-Mullen | As a seasoned physician executive and national thought leader, Irene brings a wealth of experience and expertise to the forefront of healthcare innovation. With a focus on promoting quality health and addressing inequities, she currently serves as the Chief Health Officer at Marti Health, a pioneering health services and digital health equity startup. Prior to her current endeavors, Irene made significant contributions as the Chief Health Equity Officer at IBM Watson Health. Her work received widespread recognition, earning her a place in the prestigious IBM Industry Academy of distinguished leaders. Before her time at IBM, Irene held various leadership roles at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), where she spearheaded transformative research initiatives to advance the science of health disparities. Her dedication to this field earned her numerous awards and professional recognition, including the NIH Director’s Award for sustained and outstanding leadership. |
Amelia Fiske | Amelia is a Senior Research Associate at the Institute for the History and Ethics of Medicine at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). She is a cultural anthropologist and has been working in an interdisciplinary bioethical environment since 2017. Her work is situated at the intersection of cultural anthropology, feminist science and technology studies, social medicine and bioethics, and environmental and humanities studies. She has over a decade of experience conducting interdisciplinary qualitative and ethnographic research in two key areas: 1) anthropological and critical social science approaches to bioethics, artificial intelligence, and digital and sociotechnical changes in knowledge production; 2) ethnographic attention to issues of socio-ecological justice, experiences of toxicity in the context of extraction, participatory research methods, and graphic arts. |
Naigwe Kalema | Nai is a PhD candidate in Innovation and Public Policy at the Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (UCL IIPP), UCL (University College London). Her doctoral research looks at the global political economy of digital transformation, specifically examining how global digital and AI governance influences public-sector digital transformation in the Global South. Specifically, Nai’s empirical cases look at digital public infrastructure and digital-era government projects linked to digital ID in Kenya and Uganda. Nai’s doctoral research is funded by Vinnova (The Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems) and UCL IIPP Policy Studio. Nai holds an ALM concentrating in International Relations and a Graduate Certificate in Social Justice, both degrees from Harvard (HES) and a BA from George Washington University. She also performed university coursework at Howard University and graduate coursework at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Nai is a member of the Tierra Común and ESRC Digital Good Network. |
David Lowry | David Shane Lowry is an anthropologist, enrolled member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina, and Assistant Professor of Anthropology at University of Southern Maine. He grew up in the Lumbee community in Robeson County, North Carolina. With degrees from MiT and University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, he has taught at Chicago Medical School, MIT, Biola University, and Brandeis University. David’s first book, Lumbee Pipelines: American Indian movement in the residue of settler colonialism, will be available August of 2025 with University of Nebraska Press. He is beginning a second book with MIT Press titled Indigenous MIT: why we must save science and technology from American genocide. David’s scholarship has been funded by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship (NSF GRF) and NSF RAPID. |
Alice Rangel Texeira | Alice is a PhD candidate in Philosophy at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB). Her research focuses on the ethics of artificial intelligence from a decolonial feminist perspective. She is part of the POyEticas – Politics and Ethics of Public Health research project at UAB, and a member of the Group of Humanistic Studies in Science and Technology at UAB. She is a member of the Data and Artificial Intelligence Coalition (DAIG) of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), and the Artificial Intelligence and Data Visitation group of the Research Data Alliance (RDA). |
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