Pioneering Expert in Artificial Intelligence to Headline NLN 2025 Education Summit Focused on The Challenge: Unraveling the Mysteries of AI

Pioneering Expert in Artificial Intelligence to Headline NLN 2025 Education Summit Focused on The Challenge: Unraveling the Mysteries of AI

Save the Date for September 17-19 in Orlando, Florida

Washington, DC — The National League for Nursing welcomes Dr. Maxim (Max) Topaz of Columbia University to deliver the Keynote Address at the NLN 2025 Education Summit in the Opening Session on Wednesday, September 17. This year’s event will focus on the hot topic of The Challenge: Unraveling the Mysteries of AI. Attendees will explore the impact on nursing education of this cutting-edge emerging and evolving technology.

Max Topaz, PhD, RN, MA, FAAN, FIAHSI, FACMI, is the Elizabeth Standish Gill Associate Professor of Nursing at Columbia University Medical Center and in the Columbia University Data Science Institute in New York. He employs AI and innovative technologies in his research to improve health care with methodologies that include text/data mining and automated speech processing. A pioneer in using natural language processing for health care data, Dr. Topaz is currently focused on developing AI solutions for clinical decision-making.

Dr. Topaz will bring his extensive experience as a leader and clinician in health policy, entrepreneurship, and internal medicine and urgent care to his keynote presentation, Integrating AI into Nursing Education: Innovations, Challenges and Practical Applications. With artificial intelligence rapidly transforming health care, including pivotal implications for nursing education, Dr. Topaz’s keynote will focus on introducing AI technologies, their application in nursing education, and AI’s role in enhancing nursing curricula, particularly through simulation-based learning and improving data literacy, essential for developing nursing competencies.

Additionally, he will address the ethical considerations inherent to AI, such as inaccuracies and algorithmic biases, and discuss the potential future directions that AI may take in nursing education. His presentation will help prepare nurse educators, leaders, and students for a future when AI is a fundamental component of health care.

In addition to his positions at Columbia University, Dr. Topaz is a senior research scientist at Visiting Nurse Service (VNS) Health and a visiting scholar at the University of Maribor in Slovenia. He has published more than 170 scholarly articles, and his research has been funded by more than $20 million in grants from federal and other institutions. Dr. Topaz holds a PhD from the University of Pennsylvania and earned a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School.

“Artificial intelligence, with all its promise and challenges, is helping guide the future of nursing education, paving the way to ever greater advances in patient access to quality care and better public health. We look forward to learning from Dr. Topaz about how we can maximize AI’s potential for the benefit of our students as they transition into the nursing workforce,” NLN Chair Patricia Sharpnack, DNP, RN, CNE, NEA-BC, ANEF, FAAN, Dean and Strawbridge Professor at the Breen School of Nursing and Health Professions at Ursuline College in Ohio.

“We are filled with anticipation to hear from Dr. Topaz as he educates the largest annual gathering of leaders in nursing education across the spectrum of higher education. The NLN Summit offers the most direct way to continue our journey of transformative excellence to advance the health of our nation and global community,” said NLN President and CEO Beverly Malone, PhD, RN, FAAN.

For more information about the NLN Education Summit, visit Summit.NLN.org.

 

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