Iām a PhD candidate in Cognitive Science at Columbia University.
My research focuses on responsible AI in education, with two broad goals. First, I study how the natural and long-term use of AI reshapes human cognition and social interaction. Second, I develop methods to evaluate and improve AI systems to better support educational practice.
Iāve been fortunate to be advised by Professor Renzhe Yu at Columbia University. Previously, I received my masterās degree from Beijing Normal University in STEM Education, where I was advised by Professor Ping Zhang.
š¢ News
- 2026.06 ā I will start my research intern at ETS!
- 2026.03 ā Our LAK 2026 paper on explainable AIābased data annotation received a Best Full Paper nomination!
- 2026.02 ā I will co-organize the LAK 2026 workshop āCurriculum Analytics for 21st-Century Competencies in Postsecondary Educationā in Bergen, Norway
- 2025.07 ā I will attend AIED, EDM, and L@S in July 2025 in Perlamo, Italy. Happy to connect if you'll be there too!
- 2025.04 ā I will give an online talk as a Guest Speaker and Panelist at the Educational Technology Sub-Forum of the 16th China Education Symposium at Harvard University.
- 2025.03 ā I will give an online talk as a Guest Speaker at the AI Application Sub-Forum of Columbia University Teachers College China-US Education Forum.
- 2024.11 ā Our paper āIntersectional inequalities in asynchronous academic communicationā won Best Student Paper Awards at SCiP 2024š.
- 2024.09 ā I will start my PhD in Cognitive Science at Teachers College, Columbia University!
š” Selected Publications
Please check my Google Scholar profile for a full list of publications.
Collaborative Multi-Agent Test-Time Reinforcement Learning for Reasoning. [link]
Zhiyuan Hu, Yunhai Hu, Juncheng Liu, Shuyue Stella Li, Yucheng Wang, Zhen Xu et al.
arXiv preprint arXiv:2601.09667
Enhancing LLM-Based Data Annotation with Error Decomposition. [link]
Zhen Xu, Vedant Khatri, Yijun Dai, Xiner Liu, Siyan Li, Xuanming Zhang, Renzhe Yu.
The 16th International Learning Analytics & Knowledge Conference (LAK), 2026 š Best Full Paper Nomination
Evaluating 21st-Century Competencies in Higher Education Curricula with Large Language Models: Benchmarking and Targeted Prompting Strategies. [link]
Zhen Xu, Xin Guan, Chenxi Shi, Qinhao Chen, Renzhe Yu.
Journal of Learning Analytics, 1ā24, 2026
Bringing Pedagogy into Focus: Evaluating Virtual Teaching Assistants in Asynchronous Learning Environments. [link]
ā Siyan Li, ā Zhen Xu, Vethavikashini Chithrra Raghuram, Xuanming Zhang, Renzhe Yu, Zhou Yu.
Findings of the Association for Computational Linguistics: (EMNLP Findings), 2025
From Course to Skill: Evaluating LLM Performance in Curricular Analytics. [link]
Zhen Xu, Xinjin Li, Yingqi Huan, Veronica Minaya, Renzhe Yu.
The 26th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education (AIED), 2025
Contexts Matter but How? Course-Level Correlates of Performance and Fairness Shift in Predictive Model Transfer. [link]
ā Zhen Xu, ā Joseph Olson, Nicole Pochinki, Jason Zheng, Renzhe Yu.
The 14th Learning Analytics and Knowledge Conference, 713ā724 (LAK), 2024