New Educators Wednesday Roundtable

Cynthia Lee

Lecturer, Computer Science Department
Stanford University

Cynthia Lee is a Lecturer in the Computer Science Department at Stanford. She specializes in team-based and question-based course design, and founded peerinstruction4cs.org to support educators in flipping their computer science classrooms using peer instruction. Her teaching awards include the Lloyd W. Dinkelspiel Award for exceptional contributions to undergraduate education at Stanford, a "Top 10 Papers of All Time" award at the 50th anniversary of the ACM SIGCSE technical symposium, and the Stanford Society of Women Engineers' Professor of the Year. She has a PhD in high-performance computing from UC San Diego. Her industry work experience includes NASA Ames and startups.

Lecia Barker

Associate Chair for Undergraduate Studies
Information Science,
University of Colorado Boulder

Lecia Barker is a Senior Research Scientist for the National Center for Women & Information Technology and Associate Professor in the Department of Information Science at the University of Colorado Boulder. Lecia conducts research in attracting, retaining, and advancing groups underrepresented in professional computing careers. Her studies focus on the structures that shape individuals' choices to pursue or avoid technical education and careers by understanding issues such as social climate, identity/belonging, faculty adoption of teaching and curricular practices, and sustainable organizational change. She also designs programmatic interventions to advance women's meaningful participation in computing through the NCWIT Extension Services program.

Darakhshan Mir

Assistant Professor and Jane W. Griffith Faculty Fellow,
Department of Computer Science,
Bucknell University

I am an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Bucknell University (since Fall 2015), and am currently a Class of 2017-18 Data & Society Fellow. Before that, for two years, I was the Norma Wilentz Hess Faculty Fellow at Wellesley College. In college at a technical institute in India, I had never thought I would go on to get a Ph.D. (didn't even know what that meant, or that was an option for people like me!), let alone be a professor. Owing to a few accidents, and the support of one phenomenal mentor, I ended up at Rutgers University, where I earned my Ph.D. from. There I enjoyed teaching as a teaching assistant and instructor, volunteered to teach Math at an after-school program in an inner city middle school, and participated in "outreach" activities such as a robotics workshop for middle school girls in my native Kashmir. At some point it dawned on me that I enjoyed teaching and mentoring students one-on-one so much, that it made sense to make a career out of it. I discovered that institutions that deeply care about teaching exist, and went to my first SIGCSE workshop while in graduate school. I was thrilled to learn about the different options out there, and decided to apply only to liberal arts schools (LACs), unsure if I would be a good candidate. Fortunately, I met Janet Davis at Grace Hopper that year, who offered to talk to me more about LACs, pointed me to her excellent document on the details of preparing for a teaching-focused academic job search, and offered to read and give feedback on my application. She and other members of the SIGCSE community have been an inspiration on how I can pay forward (I just managed to convince two graduate students to apply to LACs!). I dream of creating a "roadshow" with my colleague Evan Peck on "Why unsuspecting graduate students should consider a variety of academic institutions?" I really enjoy being a professor at a teaching-focused liberal arts institution — getting to interact with students closely, having an opportunity to be part of their intellectual journey, and learning from and with colleagues in various disciplines across campus. The students I have worked with both at Wellesley and Bucknell are a delight and I wouldn't trade this part of the job for anything else (grading is another matter!). My research interests are in the area of data privacy. I am deeply — intellectually, professionally, and pedagogically — engaged in teasing out the tensions between the positive and negative impacts of technologies on lives. I feel that this is an important bridge between my teacher self and my scholar self, and something I am able to explore and pursue at a liberal arts institution.

Evan Peck

Assistant Professor
Department of Computer Science
Bucknell University

I am an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Bucknell University. This Fall (2019), I am redesigning and teaching CSCI 203: Introduction to Computer Science and creating a new seminar - CSCI 201: Computer Science Seminar. My research sits at the intersection of Human-Computer Interaction and Information Visualization, and broadly explores the design of technology that empowers everyday people to understand their world through data.

Most importantly, I believe in student-centered everything.

I believe that ethics should be interwoven with CS education. I maintain a website for practice-based ethical CS activities, serve as an acting member of SIGCHI's Research Ethics Committee, served as a judge for the Mozilla Foundation's Responsible CS Challenge, and co-organized a workshop on ethical CS modules at SIGCSE 2019. I am an advocate for primarily-undergraduate institutions (PUI). I manage an email list of 40+ HCI professors at PUIs (and an in-progress website) and write and speak about the benefits of liberal arts colleges.

I see research as a mechanism to empower students and adhere to a Student-Centered Research Manifesto. I frequently publish along undergraduate students, including a Best Paper Award at the premiere venue in my professional research community - ACM CHI. I apply design processes to teaching. I design flipped classroom experiences, and encourage students to experiment and share their visions of the future.

Emilie Barnard

Regional Manager
Microsoft Philanthropies TEALS Program

I was a first-generation college student who graduated from UC Santa Barbara with a BS & MS in Computer Science, plus a BA in Mathematics. I fell in love with teaching CS while working as a TA during my graduate program. I particularly enjoy teaching first-year students who are just starting to explore the field. I've taught computer science at UCSB, Foothill College, North Seattle College, & Girls Who Code.

In 2019 I joined TEALS, a Microsoft Philanthropies program, as a Regional Manager for the PNW. TEALS partners high school teachers interested in learning and teaching computer science with industry professionals to deliver computer science courses. The goal of the program is to train high school teachers to independently support a diverse computer science pathway at their school, and increase student access to the field. In my role, I have the opportunity to train volunteers who are new to teaching, work with dedicated classroom teachers, and observe many students learn computer science for the first time.

I was an attendee of the SIGCSE New Educators Workshop in 2018, and am very excited to join this year's roundtable!

Mia Minnes

Associate Teaching Professor, LSOE
Computer Science and Engineering Department,
University of California San Diego

I am an Associate Teaching Professor (LSOE) in the Computer Science and Engineering Department. At UC San Diego, I primarily teach discrete math for CS and introduction to computability, as well as the TA training class; I enjoy branching out to other subjects as well. My research interests lie in theory of computation (specifically resource-bounded computability theory and algorithmic randomness), designing and studying community- and cohort-building initiatives, and promoting and researching writing in the discipline. Prior to joining CSE in Summer 2014, I was an SE Warschawski Visiting Assistant Professor in the Mathematics Department here at UCSD. Before that, I was a CLE Moore Instructor at MIT. I earned my PhD in Mathematics at Cornell University in 2008, co-advised by Anil Nerode and Bakhadyr Khoussainov. I earned Master's degrees in Computer Science (2006) and Mathematics (2006) from Cornell and Bachelor's degrees in Mathematics and Engineering (2003) and Philosophy (2003) from Queen's University.

Nate Derbinsky

Director of Teaching Faculty,
Khoury College of Computer Sciences,
Northeastern University

I am passionate about computer science and I strive to develop an inclusive learning environment where I can share my excitement for challenging ideas and problems, while being respectful of and responsive to student needs.

Stephanie August

Professor; Program Officer, NSF (2016-2020)
Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science,
Loyola Marymount University

Stephanie E. August is a Professor of Computer Science in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. She believes that effective computing education exists at the convergence of disciplines, and prefers to guide learning in a flipped classroom. She believes that it is possible to blend an academic and industry career with family life, while admitting that the result can be a bit messy.

Stephanie just completed a 3.5 year term as a Program Director in the National Science Foundation Division of Undergraduate Education where she worked on a variety of programs spanning undergraduate education, data science, and the future of work at the human-technology frontier. Her current research interests focus on online interactive digital learning environments and infusing other disciplines with computing concepts. She is also interested in computational models of reasoning by analogy and exploring the boundaries between people and machines. Her teaching repertoire includes courses in databases, artificial intelligence, new media (English+graphics+computing), programming 3D animation tools (animation+computing), and first year seminars (English composition+computing). Stephanie has served as director of graduate studies and Special Assistant to the Chief Academic Officer for Graduate Studies. She was principal investigator on two NSF grants focused on making computing sciences accessible and engaging for a diverse range of students and underutilized groups.

Prior to LMU Stephanie worked in industry as a staff engineer at Hughes Aircraft Company (now Raytheon) in software development and system engineering for several defense C3I programs and applied artificial intelligence research for military and medical applications. Before that she was a copy cataloger at the UCLA Research Library.

Stephanie earned her B.A. in Slavic Languages and M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Science, all from the University of California, Los Angeles. She looks forward to the day when a machine can read a novel and understand the symbolism in it.

Colleen Lewis

Assistant Professor,
Department of Computer Science,
Harvey Mudd College

I did undergrad at UC Berkeley in EECS and went to work for a few years. I missed the teaching I got to do in undergrad so much that I decided to go back to Berkeley to do a PhD in education and a MS in computer science. Starting in 2012 I became an assistant professor of computer science at Harvey Mudd College teaching computer science and doing computer science education research. My research and teaching are focused on making CS accessible to students who are traditionally underrepresented in CS. I’ve done teaching including K-12, small and large college classes, and an EdX MOOC for kids to learn Scratch.

Diane Horton

Associate Professor, Teaching
Computer Science Department,
University of Toronto

The seeds of my teaching life go back at least as far as elementary school, where I loved any opportunity to help others understand something or to assist the teacher. As an undergrad at Western University in Canada, I was amazed to be allowed to run tutorials as a TA. Later, in graduate school when I had a chance to teach CS1 it consumed me in the best possible way. I began to realize that I liked my research but I truly loved to teach. Now I am thrilled to be in a teaching stream job (that didn't even exist back then!), working with an inspiring group of colleagues.

My favourite mode of teaching is semi-inverted. I like students to learn the more basic material on their own, and to reserve learning of the juicier bits for in class. During class time, by going back and forth between active learning exercises and mini-lectures, I can tailor my explanations to what the exercises are revealing about student learning. And I can lead students to discover techniques and infer implications themselves, which is a very powerful way to learn.

Although class sizes have grown, my favourite part of my work is still the opportunity to make a difference to students by getting to know them as individuals.

Zach Dodds

Leonhard-Johnson-Rae Professor of Computer Science,
Department of Computer Science,
Harvey Mudd College

After a couple of years of high-school math teaching, a conspiracy of admissions departments decided that I would pursue CS instead of math. For me, the adage turned out to be true: you can take the teacher out of the high school, but you can't take the high school out of the teacher. A small liberal-arts college of engineeering, Mudd, offered a chance for balancing those forces. Equilibrium hasn't been reached, but the balancing act has led to some memorable journeys...

	New Educators Wednesday Roundtable - SIGCSE 2020
	Information People Advice Schedule SIGCSE-20
	Cynthia Lee Lecturer, Computer Science Department Stanford University Cynthia Lee is a Lecturer in the Computer Science Department at Stanford. She specializes in team-based and question-based course design, and founded peerinstruction4cs.org to support educators in flipping their computer science classrooms using peer instruction. Her teaching awards include the Lloyd W. Dinkelspiel Award for exceptional contributions to undergraduate education at Stanford, a "Top 10 Papers of All Time" award at the 50th anniversary of the ACM SIGCSE technical symposium, and the Stanford Society of Women Engineers' Professor of the Year. She has a PhD in high-performance computing from UC San Diego. Her industry work experience includes NASA Ames and startups. Lecia Barker Associate Chair for Undergraduate Studies Information Science, University of Colorado Boulder Lecia Barker is a Senior Research Scientist for the National Center for Women & Information Technology and Associate Professor in the Department of Information Science at the University of Colorado Boulder. Lecia conducts research in attracting, retaining, and advancing groups underrepresented in professional computing careers. Her studies focus on the structures that shape individuals' choices to pursue or avoid technical education and careers by understanding issues such as social climate, identity/belonging, faculty adoption of teaching and curricular practices, and sustainable organizational change. She also designs programmatic interventions to advance women's meaningful participation in computing through the NCWIT Extension Services program. Darakhshan Mir Assistant Professor and Jane W. Griffith Faculty Fellow, Department of Computer Science, Bucknell University I am an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Bucknell University (since Fall 2015), and am currently a Class of 2017-18 Data & Society Fellow. Before that, for two years, I was the Norma Wilentz Hess Faculty Fellow at Wellesley College. In college at a technical institute in India, I had never thought I would go on to get a Ph.D. (didn't even know what that meant, or that was an option for people like me!), let alone be a professor. Owing to a few accidents, and the support of one phenomenal mentor, I ended up at Rutgers University, where I earned my Ph.D. from. There I enjoyed teaching as a teaching assistant and instructor, volunteered to teach Math at an after-school program in an inner city middle school, and participated in "outreach" activities such as a robotics workshop for middle school girls in my native Kashmir. At some point it dawned on me that I enjoyed teaching and mentoring students one-on-one so much, that it made sense to make a career out of it. I discovered that institutions that deeply care about teaching exist, and went to my first SIGCSE workshop while in graduate school. I was thrilled to learn about the different options out there, and decided to apply only to liberal arts schools (LACs), unsure if I would be a good candidate. Fortunately, I met Janet Davis at Grace Hopper that year, who offered to talk to me more about LACs, pointed me to her excellent document on the details of preparing for a teaching-focused academic job search, and offered to read and give feedback on my application. She and other members of the SIGCSE community have been an inspiration on how I can pay forward (I just managed to convince two graduate students to apply to LACs!). I dream of creating a "roadshow" with my colleague Evan Peck on "Why unsuspecting graduate students should consider a variety of academic institutions?" I really enjoy being a professor at a teaching-focused liberal arts institution — getting to interact with students closely, having an opportunity to be part of their intellectual journey, and learning from and with colleagues in various disciplines across campus. The students I have worked with both at Wellesley and Bucknell are a delight and I wouldn't trade this part of the job for anything else (grading is another matter!). My research interests are in the area of data privacy. I am deeply — intellectually, professionally, and pedagogically — engaged in teasing out the tensions between the positive and negative impacts of technologies on lives. I feel that this is an important bridge between my teacher self and my scholar self, and something I am able to explore and pursue at a liberal arts institution. Evan Peck Assistant Professor Department of Computer Science Bucknell University I am an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Bucknell University. This Fall (2019), I am redesigning and teaching CSCI 203: Introduction to Computer Science and creating a new seminar - CSCI 201: Computer Science Seminar. My research sits at the intersection of Human-Computer Interaction and Information Visualization, and broadly explores the design of technology that empowers everyday people to understand their world through data. Most importantly, I believe in student-centered everything. I believe that ethics should be interwoven with CS education. I maintain a website for practice-based ethical CS activities, serve as an acting member of SIGCHI's Research Ethics Committee, served as a judge for the Mozilla Foundation's Responsible CS Challenge, and co-organized a workshop on ethical CS modules at SIGCSE 2019. I am an advocate for primarily-undergraduate institutions (PUI). I manage an email list of 40+ HCI professors at PUIs (and an in-progress website) and write and speak about the benefits of liberal arts colleges. I see research as a mechanism to empower students and adhere to a Student-Centered Research Manifesto. I frequently publish along undergraduate students, including a Best Paper Award at the premiere venue in my professional research community - ACM CHI. I apply design processes to teaching. I design flipped classroom experiences, and encourage students to experiment and share their visions of the future. Emilie Barnard Regional Manager Microsoft Philanthropies TEALS Program I was a first-generation college student who graduated from UC Santa Barbara with a BS & MS in Computer Science, plus a BA in Mathematics. I fell in love with teaching CS while working as a TA during my graduate program. I particularly enjoy teaching first-year students who are just starting to explore the field. I've taught computer science at UCSB, Foothill College, North Seattle College, & Girls Who Code. In 2019 I joined TEALS, a Microsoft Philanthropies program, as a Regional Manager for the PNW. TEALS partners high school teachers interested in learning and teaching computer science with industry professionals to deliver computer science courses. The goal of the program is to train high school teachers to independently support a diverse computer science pathway at their school, and increase student access to the field. In my role, I have the opportunity to train volunteers who are new to teaching, work with dedicated classroom teachers, and observe many students learn computer science for the first time. I was an attendee of the SIGCSE New Educators Workshop in 2018, and am very excited to join this year's roundtable! Mia Minnes Associate Teaching Professor, LSOE Computer Science and Engineering Department, University of California San Diego I am an Associate Teaching Professor (LSOE) in the Computer Science and Engineering Department. At UC San Diego, I primarily teach discrete math for CS and introduction to computability, as well as the TA training class; I enjoy branching out to other subjects as well. My research interests lie in theory of computation (specifically resource-bounded computability theory and algorithmic randomness), designing and studying community- and cohort-building initiatives, and promoting and researching writing in the discipline. Prior to joining CSE in Summer 2014, I was an SE Warschawski Visiting Assistant Professor in the Mathematics Department here at UCSD. Before that, I was a CLE Moore Instructor at MIT. I earned my PhD in Mathematics at Cornell University in 2008, co-advised by Anil Nerode and Bakhadyr Khoussainov. I earned Master's degrees in Computer Science (2006) and Mathematics (2006) from Cornell and Bachelor's degrees in Mathematics and Engineering (2003) and Philosophy (2003) from Queen's University. Nate Derbinsky Director of Teaching Faculty, Khoury College of Computer Sciences, Northeastern University I am passionate about computer science and I strive to develop an inclusive learning environment where I can share my excitement for challenging ideas and problems, while being respectful of and responsive to student needs. Stephanie August Professor; Program Officer, NSF (2016-2020) Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Loyola Marymount University Stephanie E. August is a Professor of Computer Science in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. She believes that effective computing education exists at the convergence of disciplines, and prefers to guide learning in a flipped classroom. She believes that it is possible to blend an academic and industry career with family life, while admitting that the result can be a bit messy. Stephanie just completed a 3.5 year term as a Program Director in the National Science Foundation Division of Undergraduate Education where she worked on a variety of programs spanning undergraduate education, data science, and the future of work at the human-technology frontier. Her current research interests focus on online interactive digital learning environments and infusing other disciplines with computing concepts. She is also interested in computational models of reasoning by analogy and exploring the boundaries between people and machines. Her teaching repertoire includes courses in databases, artificial intelligence, new media (English+graphics+computing), programming 3D animation tools (animation+computing), and first year seminars (English composition+computing). Stephanie has served as director of graduate studies and Special Assistant to the Chief Academic Officer for Graduate Studies. She was principal investigator on two NSF grants focused on making computing sciences accessible and engaging for a diverse range of students and underutilized groups. Prior to LMU Stephanie worked in industry as a staff engineer at Hughes Aircraft Company (now Raytheon) in software development and system engineering for several defense C3I programs and applied artificial intelligence research for military and medical applications. Before that she was a copy cataloger at the UCLA Research Library. Stephanie earned her B.A. in Slavic Languages and M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Science, all from the University of California, Los Angeles. She looks forward to the day when a machine can read a novel and understand the symbolism in it. Colleen Lewis Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science, Harvey Mudd College I did undergrad at UC Berkeley in EECS and went to work for a few years. I missed the teaching I got to do in undergrad so much that I decided to go back to Berkeley to do a PhD in education and a MS in computer science. Starting in 2012 I became an assistant professor of computer science at Harvey Mudd College teaching computer science and doing computer science education research. My research and teaching are focused on making CS accessible to students who are traditionally underrepresented in CS. I’ve done teaching including K-12, small and large college classes, and an EdX MOOC for kids to learn Scratch. Diane Horton Associate Professor, Teaching Computer Science Department, University of Toronto The seeds of my teaching life go back at least as far as elementary school, where I loved any opportunity to help others understand something or to assist the teacher. As an undergrad at Western University in Canada, I was amazed to be allowed to run tutorials as a TA. Later, in graduate school when I had a chance to teach CS1 it consumed me in the best possible way. I began to realize that I liked my research but I truly loved to teach. Now I am thrilled to be in a teaching stream job (that didn't even exist back then!), working with an inspiring group of colleagues. My favourite mode of teaching is semi-inverted. I like students to learn the more basic material on their own, and to reserve learning of the juicier bits for in class. During class time, by going back and forth between active learning exercises and mini-lectures, I can tailor my explanations to what the exercises are revealing about student learning. And I can lead students to discover techniques and infer implications themselves, which is a very powerful way to learn. Although class sizes have grown, my favourite part of my work is still the opportunity to make a difference to students by getting to know them as individuals. Zach Dodds Leonhard-Johnson-Rae Professor of Computer Science, Department of Computer Science, Harvey Mudd College After a couple of years of high-school math teaching, a conspiracy of admissions departments decided that I would pursue CS instead of math. For me, the adage turned out to be true: you can take the teacher out of the high school, but you can't take the high school out of the teacher. A small liberal-arts college of engineeering, Mudd, offered a chance for balancing those forces. Equilibrium hasn't been reached, but the balancing act has led to some memorable journeys...