Reconfiguring Frontline Social Work Through AI: Why Human-Centered Practice Matters More Than Ever

人工智慧重構一線社會工作：以人為本實務何以益顯其要

Dr. Ning Tang 唐寧博士

Founder & CEO, Dawning Consulting, China

中國道寧咨詢創始人兼總經理

Abstract: When AI enters frontline social services, it enters practice contexts that are relational, situated, ethically complex, and deeply human. The central challenge is not simply how to bring AI into social work, but how to make professional wisdom visible enough for AI to support it without flattening the human complexity of practice. Drawing on three practice-based cases in China—a professional knowledge base for casework and psychosocial support; a home-visiting AI assistant for children facing adversity; and AI agents for assessment and individualized education planning in a special education setting—the plenary illustrates AI-enabled professional scaffolding as a way of turning professional values, competencies, workflows, and micro-level judgments into structured support for practitioners, without shifting professional responsibility from human workers to AI. AI will not replace the human core of social work, but it will require us to redesign how frontline practice is supported, documented, supervised, and taught.

Bio: Dr. Ning Tang is the founder and CEO of DawningTech, where she develops AI-enabled tools and service platform for frontline psychosocial services. She holds a PhD in Social Work from the University of Alabama, and previously served as an Assistant Professor and Chair of the Department of Social Work at the University of Saint Joseph in Macao. Her career spans social work education, crisis intervention, nonprofit leadership, program evaluation, and professional capacity building. Drawing on both academic and practice-based experience, Dr. Tang is committed to strengthening accessible, professional, and AI-enabled psychosocial support systems in Chinese communities.