Tamara Tate, PhD

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Tamara Tate is Associate Director of the Digital Learning Lab.

Her research focuses on technology-supported learning, school-based digital literacy interventions, and analysis of digital writing.

Tamara leads the Lab's work on generative AI and writing. As the PI of a NSF-funded grant, she is studying the use of generative AI in undergraduate writing courses. In our California Learning Lab AI Grand Challenge Grant, we are extending this work to CSUs and California Community Colleges. We are also working with middle school teachers to bring generative AI to ELA classes.

Tamara received her B.A. in English and her Ph.D. in Education at U.C. Irvine and her J.D. at U.C. Berkeley. 

Tamara can be reached at [email protected]
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Generative AI & Writing

The development and rapid diffusion of generative artificial intelligence since November 2022 represents a great disruption to writing and writing education. Educators need research-based guidance on how and when to teach their students to use AI in writing without compromising the development of students’ writing skills. At heart is a contradiction–if we don’t teach students to use these powerful new AI tools, we will be robbing them of the AI literacy they need for their future study and careers. However, if we allow them to use AI in unmonitored ways at too young an age, students will develop neither the writing nor AI literacy skills needed for success. 

I am currently the PI of an NSF grant which is developing a generative AI-based platform and curriculum for use in writing instruction. This project is using design-based implementation research to understand the best practices for integrating AI writing tools into an undergraduate engineering writing course and the impact such integration has on students’ development as writers. We are iteratively developing a curriculum that can be used to integrate AI writing tools into undergraduate writing and communication courses, a pedagogically informed AI writing platform to ensure reliable and scaffolded access to generative AI, and professional development to support instructor use of the curriculum and platform. The AI tool helps students improve their writing and AI literacy by allowing them to interact with AI in a structured, scaffolded, and bounded way. Students receive personalized support by using the embedded prompts in the platform while writing, with a particular focus on helping them effectively plan and revise their writing, both underutilized parts of the writing process of developing writers.  Visit the project website at genaied.org to learn more and access our resources.

Upcoming poster presentation
Tate, T. P., Harnick-Shapiro, B., Tseng, W., Dennin, M., & Warschauer, M. (2026, June). Student responses to the integration of generative AI into an upper division engineering writing course (IUSE) [Poster presentation]. American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition, Charlotte NC. 

We already see widespread adoption of AI in business and the world at large (Dell’Acqua et al., 2023). Banning or ignoring AI writing tools will fail to prepare our undergraduates for the professional world where such tools will be both embraced and valued. Indeed, AI literacy is a requisite for both future employment and civic engagement (Ng. et al., 2021) in today’s and tomorrow’s world. This study shows that students in an upper division writing course for engineers reported increasing familiarity and comfort with using generative AI. Their reflections suggest a majority of them used the AI responsibly and effectively when provided with instructional support for doing so. Thus, learning if, when, and how to effectively use generative AI as part of a writer’s process is a key new part of literacy. If we can help students build effective habits and understanding of AI’s affordances and limitations, they will be better prepared for their future.

Episode 24: Melts into Air, Teaching Writing in the Age of AI with Stephanie Tran and Tamara Tate

Latest blog

Recent keynote: 13th Annual SLO Symposium "For such a time as this"

Recent Publications

Incorporating generative AI into a writing-intensive
​undergraduate course without off-loading learning
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Read the paper
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