Tina AustinGAInable™Work With Tina
Menu
GAInable™ — Making AI gains durable.

Tina Austin

Helping people
learn and think
better with AI.

Researching AI’s effects on human cognition and learning. Creator of UnBlooms™, a framework for redesigning learning and assessment for the AI era.

Explore UnBlooms™ Try the GAInable Test

The question guiding my work: what stays with the human?

Tina Austin speaking to an audience at a conference
From research to the room.Educator · Researcher · Creator of UnBlooms™
Better output is the beginning.Durable human capability is the goal.
Faculty supported
Countries reached
UC systems
ASU+GSV Top Women in AI

Featured by · Recognized by · Invited to speak

CNN
OpenAI
Microsoft
UCLA
University of
Oxford
University of Cambridge
UNESCOParis
The Marconi Society

01 / The work

What can we do better
after the AI is gone?

My work connects research, learning design, and institutional practice around one aim: AI use that strengthens people’s ability to think, learn, and judge over time.

01

Redesign learning

Make reasoning visible. Design assignments and assessment around what learners understand and can carry forward.

The UnBlooms™ framework 02

Ask better questions

Examine retention, transfer, metacognition, and the human capability that remains beyond an AI-assisted task.

Research & ideas 03

Put it into practice

Bring the human capability question into faculty development, institutional decisions, and conversations about AI.

Speaking & advisory

02 / The flagship framework

UnBlooms™
Make thinking visible.

A recursive approach to learning and assessment in the AI era, created by Tina Austin.

UnBlooms™ puts human reasoning at the center. Learners question, generate, critique, and refine—returning to earlier thinking as their understanding develops. Metacognition anchors the process.

Explore the UnBlooms™ framework

A process to return to, not a ladder to climb

  1. 01

    Question

    Frame the problem. Surface assumptions.

  2. 02

    Generate

    Develop ideas, with or without AI.

  3. 03

    Critique

    Examine evidence, gaps, and consequences.

  4. 04

    Refine

    Rethink, improve, and loop back.

Metacognition, throughout.
What changed in my thinking—and why?

The UnBlooms™ Workbook

How to Design, Teach, and Assess Human Reasoning in the AI Era

Buy the workbook

The principle behind the work

GAInable™

Making AI gains durable.

AI use that leaves people better able to think, learn, judge, and perform later—including without AI.

Performance gain

“I can do this better now.”

AI improves the immediate task or output.

GAInable gain

“I am more capable later.”

The experience builds understanding, judgment, and capability that carry forward.

GAInable™ is the principle. UnBlooms™ is the learning and assessment framework that puts it into practice.

A tool to take with you

The GAInable™ Test.
Four questions. A longer view.

Choose one AI use you’re considering. Work through the questions, then take your answers into your next team conversation. Download a blank worksheet or add your reflections first.

0 of 4 questions reflected on.
Your notes stay in this page until you download them.

Turn reflection into a decision. Name the capability you want people to retain, what you need to protect, and when you’ll check back. Revisit your answers as the effects of AI use become clearer.

03 / Research & ideas

Beyond the output.
Into the outcomes.

Better work today does not, by itself, tell us what someone has learned. My research interests focus on what persists, what transfers, and how we can meaningfully measure it.

01 / Retention

What stays with the learner?

Understanding what people remember and can explain after the immediate support is removed.

02 / Transfer

Does learning travel?

Examining whether people can apply their understanding to a different problem or context.

03 / Metacognition

Can we judge our own thinking?

Exploring how AI use shapes monitoring, uncertainty, and awareness of what we do and do not know.

04 / Longitudinal outcomes

What changes over time?

Asking how repeated AI use relates to the development of independent human capability.

Essays, questions, and reflections from the work.

Read the articles Follow on Substack

What educators and leaders say

Trusted in the work.
Remembered for the impact.

From faculty learning to institutional decisions, the work begins with people and the challenges they actually face.

Tina’s UnBlooms Framework transformed how our faculty think about AI in the classroom. She doesn’t just present research — she makes it immediately actionable.
Dr. Jeannette A.Dean of InstructionHeartland Charter School
We invited Tina to keynote our AI Summit and the faculty response was extraordinary. She has a rare ability to hold complexity with grace and make it feel manageable.
Dr. L. VokosSenior LecturerUniversity of Glasgow
Tina’s advisory work helped us build an AI governance framework we’re actually proud of — grounded in equity, not just efficiency. She asks the right hard questions.
Nyree C.Curriculum DirectorCJUSD

04 / Speaking & advisory

Bring the human question
into the room.

For universities, organizations, and teams ready to connect AI decisions with learning, reasoning, and human capability.

01 / A shared starting point

Keynotes & conversations

Bring a research-informed perspective on AI, cognition, and durable learning to your institution or event.

  • Keynote or facilitated conversation
  • Focus shaped around your audience
  • A shared language for the decisions ahead
Per-event engagementContact Tina for availability and a tailored quote.
Discuss your event
02 / Applied faculty learning

Workshops & design partnerships

Apply UnBlooms™ to the assignments, assessment practices, and learning goals your educators are working on.

  • Workshop or scoped series
  • Assignment and assessment redesign
  • Practical ways to make reasoning visible
Scoped to your teamContact Tina to discuss format, scope, and pricing.
Plan a workshop
03 / Sustained institutional support

Long-term advisory partner

A critical friend alongside your team as you connect AI strategy, faculty development, and human outcomes.

  • 3–12 month partnership
  • Leadership conversations and draft review
  • Support as priorities and practice evolve
3–12 months · Custom proposalContact Tina to shape the partnership and investment.
Explore a partnership
Work With Tina View the speaker kit
Tina Austin discussing learning and assessment during a presentation
Connecting research with the realities of teaching.

05 / About Tina

Researcher. Educator.
Always asking why.

I work at the intersection of AI, human cognition, and learning.

My background spans biomedical research and higher education, with teaching across UCLA, USC, CSU, and Caltech. That perspective shapes a central question: how do we design AI use that develops human capability over time?

I created UnBlooms™ to help educators make reasoning visible in learning and assessment. Through GAInable™, I bring that same focus to research, speaking, and institutional advisory work.

Connect on LinkedIn

The next conversation

What should people
carry forward?

Let’s design AI use around the human capability you want to grow.

Start a conversation