Leadership Examples in Tech Rarely Look Like Me
Informatics PhD student Jason Lucas credits his mentors for helping him along his academic journey. His decision to come to Penn State was influenced by Theodore Hollis, a professor emeritus in Penn State’s Eberly College of Science, who mentored Lucas at St. George’s University in Grenada, West Indies.
“My commitment to mentoring is deeply influenced Dr. Hollis, who told me that the best way to repay his guidance was to one day do the same for others,” Lucas said. “This philosophy has shaped my approach to service throughout my career.”
But even before coming to Penn State, Lucas was actively mentoring underrepresented youth through community programs he developed, using dance as a gateway to engage them in educational opportunities. Today, he mentors IST students from diverse backgrounds because he firmly believes in helping the next generation of technology leaders find their path.
“Having navigated challenges in my own educational journey, I find deep fulfillment in helping students discover their strengths and develop strategies to overcome obstacles,” Lucas said. “I understand firsthand how important tailored guidance can be, especially for students from underrepresented backgrounds or those facing additional challenges.”
Lucas currently mentors several undergraduate students working on projects related to AI for social good, multilingual NLP, and deepfake detection. Seeing these students grow in confidence and skill while tackling meaningful research problems has been incredibly rewarding,
He’s particularly proud of the Millennium Scholars he’s mentored through the PIKE Research Lab, who are making significant contributions to multilingual NLP research as undergraduates. The PIKE (Penn State Information, Knowledge, and wEb) group studies research issues involving the management of and mining in data in diverse forms and their social or security applications.
"Having navigated challenges in my own educational journey, I find deep fulfillment in helping students discover their strengths and develop strategies to overcome obstacles."
“My mentoring philosophy focuses on building independence while providing consistent support,” he said. “Rather than simply giving answers, I help students develop problem-solving skills and foster their curiosity, all while ensuring they know they have a reliable advocate in their corner.”
Coming to Penn State was an eye-opening experience regarding representation in his field. He quickly realized that as a Black man in tech, he was in a significant minority—in IST, across most universities, and at conferences where he presents research.
“This was a jarring transition from my life in Grenda, where I never felt ‘other’ in a diverse and inclusive environment,” he said. “Being the only Black man in my PhD program and consistently representing fewer than 1% of attendees at conferences where I publish creates moments where I feel out of place. Leadership examples in tech rarely look like me, and this visible disparity becomes particularly apparent in academic and industry settings.”
However, attending the BLK Men in Tech THRIVE Conference in 2024 was transformative and grounding.
“My experience there was profound in two ways,” Lucas said. “First, I had the valuable opportunity to bond with IST's Black undergraduate community as their chaperone, getting to know these young Black men in tech beyond surface interactions. Second, networking with, learning from, and engaging with Black leadership in my field renewed my belief that not only can I succeed, but I can excel beyond current limitations.”
IST students attend BLK Men in Tech THRIVE Conference
The experience also highlighted serious gaps in tech research and development.
“Much of today's research literature and AI models fail to incorporate Black Afro-Caribbean perspectives, languages, and experiences,” he said. “Technologies rarely account for Caribbean vernacular or languages such as Haitian Creole or Jamaican Patois. More concerningly, low-resource communities—often predominantly Black and brown—are disproportionately impacted by malicious tech manipulation while being least equipped to respond due to financial and technological constraints.”
Despite these challenges, Lucas has found strength in community and purpose in addressing these disparities through his research.
“My identity as a Black man in tech has become both a unique perspective I bring to the field and a driving motivation to make technology more inclusive and representative,” he said.
