In this episode, Phil reports to Mat on his adventures at the TESOL 2026 Convention in Salt Lake City, March 24-27. Phil talked with exhibitors and attended as many AI-focused presentations, panels, and posters as he could to get a sense of how AI, especially GenAI, is being presented by and to professional English language teachers. Mat comments on the value of panels and the conversations at conferences that take place during breaks and in the evening.

• General themes
  • Mix of skepticism and excitement
  • Some hype and naive applications, but less than expected
  • Highlighting of ethics and critical AI Literacy (E.g., CALL Interest Section panel on AI ethics: