Cornell Bowers News November 2024

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Dear Bowers community,

We are getting to the time of the semester when the workload is heavy and schedules are busy. In addition, over the last several days, there have been some tragic and upsetting events on campus that may affect us in a variety of personal ways.

I hope you will take proactive steps to prioritize your well-being. Please connect with your peers and community, and seek assistance from advisors and the various Cornell resources. Our student services team and our DEIB office are here to help and support you. Don’t hesitate to reach out if we can help in any way.

I hope the upcoming Thanksgiving break is restful and filled with time with loved ones.

Best wishes,

Kavita Bala

Dean

Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science

dean@cis.cornell.edu

He, MPS ‘22, on the value of a graduate degree in applied statistics

Jimi He, MPS ’22, is a data scientist at Microsoft, where he develops and implements natural language processing (NLP) models used on Microsoft’s Bing Ads platform. In spring 2022, as a student in Cornell’s master of professional studies (MPS) program in data science and applied statistics, He and his teammates won the Best Project Award with “Critical Risk Index for Space Weather” in the MPS Project course.

Hochstedler Webb, Ph.D. ’24, receives Cox Scholarship

Kimberly A. Hochstedler Webb, Ph.D. ’24, has been awarded the Gertrude M. Cox Scholarship from the American Statistical Association (ASA). Her research involves designing novel statistical methodologies for imperfect data to answer questions in public health and the social sciences.

For more than 60 years, Diwali celebration brings light to campus

As the days get shorter and the clocks turn back, the student group Society for India is bringing light to campus with Diya Jale – the longest-standing campus celebration of Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, in North America.

Ayan Kohli ‘28

Photo provided: The Punjabi dance group Cornell Bhangra performs at the 2023 Diya Jale.

Student creates smart glasses for people with hearing loss

Nirbhay Narang ’25, a computer science major, has created smart glasses to help people manage living with hearing loss. The glasses use AI to provide transcriptions of conversations in real time, which can be viewed both on the glasses and on a phone. Tapan Parikh collaborated on the project.

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Melissa Reifman, a CS M.Eng. student, was awarded a Lester B. Knight Scholarship.

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Foster named associate dean for research

Nate Foster, professor of computer science, has been named the next associate dean for research for the college beginning Nov. 18. Foster succeeds Thorsten Joachims, the Jacob Gould Schurman Professor of computer science and information science, who first held this position in 2021.

Kraig Kayser, left, chairman of the Cornell Board of Trustees, presents President Emerita Martha E. Pollack with a photo of the plaza that will be named in her honor.

New plaza at heart of Cornell Bowers CIS to be named for Martha Pollack

A plaza dedicated and named in honor of Cornell’s 14th president, Martha E. Pollack, will be part of the new Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science building and complex, connecting it with Gates Hall.

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For second year, Legunsen receives Distinguished Paper Award at ISSTA

Owolabi Legunsen, assistant professor of computer science, received a Distinguished Paper award for the second year in a row at the ACM SIGSOFT International Symposium on Software Testing and Analysis (ISSTA).

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Matteson, Tupper, Ph.D. ’16, among collaborators on $1.85M NIH grant

David Matteson, associate chair of the Department of Statistics and Data Science and professor of statistics and data science and social statistics, and Laurie Tupper, Ph.D. ’16, an associate professor of statistics at Mount Holyoke College, are among three outside collaborators working with Applied BioPhysics, who were recently awarded a two-year, $1.85 million Small Business Innovation Research grant from NIH.

Roberts among the 28 Cornellians awarded Fellowships in Engaged Learning

Dr. LeeAnn Roberts, director of the Office of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging at Cornell Bowers CIS, was among 28 Cornellians from 10 Cornell schools and colleges who have been named 2024-25 Engaged Fellows.

Cornell Bowers well-represented among the AAAI-24 award winners

Best Student Paper for the AI for Social Impact track at AAAI-24:

Yiwei Bai
Marc Grimson
Carla Gomes

Honorable Mention:

Christopher De Sa
James Grimmelmann
Jon Kleinberg

3 color photos showing the "Dream Grant" winners

Dream Grants jumpstart student projects

All students in the college have ambitious dreams for their future, but some of those dreams take a little extra help to come true. That's where the Dream Grants program comes in.

Each semester, students from across the college can receive up to $1,000 to advance their dream, whether they wish to develop an app, found a startup, present their research at a conference – or something entirely new.

Researchers in climate science, nanoparticles among 12 newest Eric and Wendy Schmidt AI in Science Postdoctoral Fellows

Nanoparticles that could change materials science. Better models to predict the potential for global carbon offsets. More efficient and cheaper solar panels. These are some of the research projects from 12 of the newest Eric and Wendy Schmidt AI in Science Postdoctoral Fellows from Cornell.