AI Tennessee Summit Agenda
March 26: 9 a.m. – 3 p.m.
8:30 A.M. REGISTRATION AND NETWORKING
9:00 a.m. Welcome Back + Framing
Flora Tydings
Chancellor, Tennessee Board of Regents
9:14 a.m. Reflections on AI Workforce Development
Deniece Thomas
Deputy Commissioner, State of Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development
9:26 a.m. Panel: Teaching, Learning, and Earning in the Age of AI: Opportunities for Tennessee
Ted Townsend
President and CEO, Greater Memphis Chamber
Dr. Sara Heyburn Morrison
Executive Director, Tennessee State Board of Education
Moderator
David Mansouri
President and CEO, Tennessee SCORE
9:58 a.m. Panel: From Education to Upskilling: Enhancing TN’s AI Talent Pipeline
Dr. Scott Langford
Superintendent, Sumner County Schools
Meka Egwuekwe
CEO, CodeCrew
Dr. Chris Whaley
President, Roane State Community College
Moderator
Dr. Michael Torrence
President, Motlow State Community College
10:48 a.m. Networking Break
11:15 a.m. Panel: Volunteer Value: Why AI Startups Are Choosing Tennessee
John Derrick
Founder and CEO, Authentrics.AI
Cal Westenberg
CEO, Mobius AI
Wesley Montague
CEO, Ship It Pro
Jian Huang
Founder, VisualizAI
Moderator
Lindsey Cox
CEO, LaunchTN
12:02 p.m. Lunch + Remarks from Senator Bo Watson
Bo Watson
Senator, Tennessee General Assembly
1:19 p.m. Panel: Meeting Today’s AI Needs: From Strategy to Action in 2026
Josh Brown
President and CEO, Tennessee Chamber of Commerce & Industry
Matthew Kittrell
Member of the Board of Directors, Knoxville Technology Council and Director, CGI
Keri Cagle
SVP, ORAU and Director, ORISE
Whitney Staub-Juergens DNP-HSL, MSN, RN, NE-BC
Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, HCA Healthcare
Moderator
Dr. Ozlem Kilic
Vice Provost and Founding Dean, University of Tennessee, Knoxville College of Emerging and Collaborative Studies
2:06 p.m. Panel: Tennessee at the Frontier of Autonomous Discovery: AI Labs and the Genesis Mission
Sreenivas Rangan Sukumar
Senior Director, AI for Science and Innovation, AMD
Gina Tourassi
Associate Laboratory Director of the Computing and Computational Sciences Directorate, ORNL
Sergei Kalinin
Weston Fulton Professor, University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Robbie Robinson
Chief AI Officer, Y-12
Moderator
Deborah Crawford
Vice Chancellor for Research, Innovation, & Economic Development, University of Tennessee, Knoxville
2:53 p.m. 3:00 p.m. Closing & Next Steps
Dr. Vasileios Maroulas
Associate Vice Chancellor, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and Director, AI Tennessee
Roger Waynick
Director of Artificial Intelligence, State of Tennessee