Keynote Speakers

Opening Keynote Speaker: Dr. Tia Brown McNair

Dr. Tia Brown McNair is a nationally recognized leader on inclusive excellence, high-impact practices, student readiness, equity in student outcomes, and campus climate. She is a Partner at Sova, a company that facilitates transformative change through actionable strategies and practical implementation support. Prior to joining Sova, she was the Vice President in the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Student Success and Executive Director for the Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation (TRHT) Campus Centers. In her senior leadership position at AAC&U, she oversaw both funded projects and AAC&U’s continuing programs on inclusive excellence, high-impact practices (HIPs), student success, and campus climate, and directed AAC&U’s Summer Institutes on HIPs and Student Success, and TRHT Campus Centers. She is the co-author of From Equity Talk to Equity Walk: Expanding Practitioner Knowledge for Racial Justice in Higher Education (January 2020) and Becoming a Student-Ready College: A New Culture of Leadership for Student Success (July 2016 and August 2022 Second edition). McNair is the editor of Strengthening Campus Communities Through the Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation Framework published by Routledge in June 2024. In March 2025, she received the Facilitator Award at Stetson Law’s 46th Annual National Conference on Law & Higher Education. NASPA, the association of Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education, named McNair the 2024 recipient of the Outstanding Contribution to Higher Education Award. In May 2023, McNair received an honorary degree from Franklin Pierce University for her national work to dismantle a false belief in a hierarchy of human value.

Closing Keynote Speaker: Lee Rainie

Lee Rainie is the Director of Elon University's Imagining the Digital Future Center, where he leads research on the human impact of accelerating digital transformation.

Prior to joining Elon, Rainie served for 24 years as director of the Pew Research Center's Internet & Technology team. Under his leadership, the Pew Internet Project produced more than 850 reports documenting the social, political, and economic effects of four major technology revolutions: the rise of the internet and broadband, mobile connectivity, social media, and artificial intelligence. The American Sociological Association gave Rainie its award for “excellence in the reporting on social issues” and described his work as the “most authoritative source of reliable data on the use and impact of the internet and mobile connectivity.” He regularly speaks to government officials, media outlets and leaders, scholars and students, technology executives, librarians, civic and nonprofit groups about the changing media ecosystem.

Prior to launching Pew Research Center’s technology research, Rainie was managing editor of U.S. News & World Report.

Rainie is co-author of Networked: The New Social Operating System and five other books exploring the future of internet technology, all grounded in rigorous survey research and data analysis. He was also one of the authors of the 2024 and 2025 Student Guide to Artificial Intelligence, a free resource created by Elon University and the American Association of Colleges & Universities (AAC&U).