Dean's Lecture Series: Sheikh Hamad Abdulla Jassim Al-Thani
2024-02-21 13:00 - 14:00 (Europe/Moscow) | Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar
Sheikh Hamad Abdulla Jassim Al-Thani, Chief Executive Officer of Vodafone Qatar will be speaking at Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar as part of the Dean’s Lecture Series. His lecture “The role of telecommunications companies in human development” will take place at Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar.
The Dean’s Lecture Series is the principal forum for eminent industry practitioners and government officials to bring their knowledge and perspectives to Carnegie Mellon, and to broaden students’ understanding of important issues.

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About the speaker
Prior to joining Vodafone Qatar, Sheikh Hamad served in the Oil and Gas sector in various areas such as industrial network engineering and control system engineering. Sheikh Hamad Al-Thani joined Vodafone Qatar in 2013, and is currently Vodafone Qatar’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO). He is responsible for the overall creation, implementation, and integration of the long-range strategic, financial, commercial and operational direction of the company. In addition, Sheikh Hamad currently holds the position of Chairman at Meeza. Previously, he served as Vodafone Qatar’s Chief Operations Officer where he was responsible for the Company’s Customer Operations, Human Resources, Legal & Regulatory and External Affairs functions.

Lecture: Case Studies in Open Science
2023-03-21 13:00 - 14:00 | 1213
Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar welcomes Sayeed Choudhury, Director of the Open Source Programs Office at Carnegie Mellon University, to speak as part of the Gloriana St. Clair Distinguished Lecture in 21st Century Librarianship. Distinguished lectures in 21st century librarianship are named in honor of Gloriana St. Clair, dean of libraries emerita, who served as dean of Carnegie Mellon University Libraries from 1998 to 2013.

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About the lecture

The US White House has declared 2023 to be the “Year of Open Science” with the following definition of open science: “The principle and practice of making research products and processes available to all, while respecting diverse cultures, maintaining security and privacy, and fostering collaborations, reproducibility, and equity.” While this definition represents an important milestone for open science, what does it mean in practical terms such as impact on researchers, the public who benefit from research, and the development of infrastructure to support open science. In this talk, Sayeed Choudhury will discuss multiple case studies of open science that explore this question, particularly in the context of global developments regarding open science.

About the speaker

Sayeed Choudhury is the Director of the Open Source Programs Office (OSPO) at Carnegie Mellon University. Previously, he was Associate Dean for Digital Infrastructure, Applications, and Services and Hodson Director of the Digital Research and Curation Center at the Sheridan Libraries of Johns Hopkins University (JHU). Choudhury was a President Obama appointee to the National Museum and Library Services Board. He was a member of the National Academies Committee on Forecasting Costs for Preserving, Archiving, and Promoting Access to Biomedical Data and a member of the National Academies Board on Research Data and Information. He was also a member of the Blue Ribbon Task Force on Sustainable Digital Preservation and Access. He has testified for the Research Subcommittee of the Congressional Committee on Science, Space and Technology.

Choudhury has served as principal investigator for projects funded through the National Science Foundation, Institute of Museum and Library Services, Library of Congress’ NDIIPP, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Open Society Foundation, Microsoft Research, and a Maryland based venture capital group.

Choudhury has published articles in journals such as the International Journal of Digital Curation, D-Lib, the Journal of Digital Information, First Monday, and Library Trends. He has served on committees for the Digital Curation Conference, Open Repositories, Joint Conference on Digital Libraries, and Web-Wise.

He has presented at various conferences including Educause, CNI, JISC-CNI, DLF, ALA, ACRL, and international venues including IFLA, the Kanazawa Information Technology Roundtable, eResearch Australasia, the North America-China Conference, eResearch New Zealand and the Arabian-Gulf Chapter of the Special Libraries Conference.

Lecture: Sparking social impact by using math to align incentives
2023-03-05 16:00 - 17:00 | 1213
About the lecture

The scale of national and international societal problems can be daunting. One person, or even a small team, are minuscule relative to the number of people who require assistance. There is an area close to mathematics, however, which devises solutions in which problems solve themselves even through self-serving human behavior: Game Theory.
The speaker is a pure math professor and researcher who transitioned to using Game Theory to develop new solutions for large-scale real-world problems. He will talk about his experience going from the ivory tower of academia into the practical mess of the real world, where he ultimately innovated fundamentally new approaches to pandemic control (https://novid.org) and advanced math education (https://live.poshenloh.com).
This talk is designed for the general community, to demonstrate the importance of supporting even the purest of university research, and to show multiple examples of the impact that strong research universities can have in the real world.

About the speaker

Po-Shen Loh is a social entrepreneur and inventor, working across the spectrum of mathematics, education, and healthcare, all around the world. He is a math professor at Carnegie Mellon University, and the national coach of the USA International Mathematical Olympiad team. He has pioneered innovations ranging from a scalable way to learn challenging math live online at comparable engagement to live-streaming entertainment, to a new way to control pandemics by leveraging self-interest.
As an academic, Po-Shen has earned distinctions ranging from an International Mathematical Olympiad silver medal to the United States Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers. His scientific research considers a variety of questions that lie at the intersection of combinatorics (the study of discrete systems), probability theory, and computer science. As an educator, he was the coach of Carnegie Mellon University’s math team when it achieved its first-ever #1 rank among all North American universities, and the coach of the USA Math Olympiad team when it achieved its first-ever back-to-back #1-rank victories in 2015 and 2016, and then again in 2018 and 2019. His research and educational outreach takes him to cities across the world, reaching over 10,000 people each year through public lectures and events, and he has featured in or co-created videos totaling over 19 million YouTube views.
Po-Shen received his undergraduate degree in mathematics from Caltech in 2004, master’s degree in mathematics from the University of Cambridge in 2005, Ph.D. in mathematics from Princeton in 2009, and has been on the faculty at Carnegie Mellon University ever since.

Lecture: Regrowing your Head; Regeneration in the Sea Star
2023-02-23 13:00 - 14:00 | 1213
Veronica Hinman, Dr. Frederick A. Schwertz Distinguished Professor of Life Sciences, Professor and Head, Department of Biological Sciences at Carnegie Mellon will be speaking as part of the Bill Brown Distinguished Lecture in Biological Sciences. Distinguished lectures in biological sciences are named in honor of Bill Brown, head of the Department of Biological Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University from 1995 to 2000. Brown was a visiting professor of biological sciences at Carnegie Mellon Qatar in 2007.

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About the lecture
Regrowing Your Head: Regeneration in the Sea Star
Regeneration is a fascinating process by which animals are able to reform lost tissues following traumatic injury. Some animals, including sea stars, are super-regenerators and are able to undergo whole-body regeneration following bisection into two halves. This process involves many poorly understood phenomena including how the remaining cells sense the tissue loss, and how they reprogram to form the missing tissues and organ systems. I will present our recent work seeking to understand how sea star larvae are able to regenerate their anterior body, including their nervous system following bisection. I will show how evolutionarily conserved wounding processes establish the reprogramming of cell lineages, re-establish anterior-posterior patterning and then recapitulate embryogenesis. I present these findings within an evolutionary framework of these processes in other animals to highlight similarities and differences in this process.

Lecture: People, Processes, and Incentives: Collective Intelligence and the Future of Organizations
2023-02-22 13:00 - 14:00 | 1213
Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar welcomes Anita Williams Woolley, professor of organizational behavior and associate dean of research at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business, to speak as part of the Richard M. Cyert Distinguished Lecture in Business Administration. The Richard M. Cyert Distinguished Lecture in Business Management is named after Richard M. Cyert, who was professor and dean of the Tepper School of Business and president of Carnegie Mellon University between 1972 and 1990.

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About the lecture
People, Processes, and Incentives: Collective Intelligence and the Future of Organizations
The environment surrounding organizations is becoming more complex, and traditional ways of managing people, processes, and incentives in organizations can make it hard to adapt. In an adjacent field, research on intelligence has focused on the capabilities that enable a system to adapt and accomplish goals in changing environments for almost a century. Building on that work, my collaborators and I have examined collective intelligence in human systems, identifying the memory, attention, and reasoning functions that need to be fulfilled for intelligence to emerge. We apply these insights in our current research where we teach AI agents how to recognize good collaboration in human systems in order to develop new ways to intervene to increase collective intelligence
About the speaker
Anita Williams Woolley is a professor of organizational behavior and the associate dean of research at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business. Professor Woolley received her doctorate in organizational behavior from Harvard University, and her research includes seminal work on team collective intelligence, which was first published in Science in 2010 and has been featured in over 5000 publications and media outlets since. Her papers have been published in Science, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Academy of Management Review, Organization Science, and Management Science, among others. Her research has been funded by grants from the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Army, and DARPA, as well as private corporations. Currently, Professor Woolley is a senior editor at Organization Science and a founding associate editor of Collective Intelligence. At the Tepper School, she teaches courses on managing teams and leading global and distributed teams.

Celebrating Women in STEM: A panel discussion
2023-02-12 16:30 - 17:30 | Assembly Area
We need to recognize the role of women and girls in STEM, not only as beneficiaries, but also as role models of change. Join us as we bring together alumna to understand more about the experiences of early career female scientists in Qatar and beyond and celebrate them as agents of change.

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A. Nico Habermann Distinguished Lecture in Computer Science: Martial Hebert
2023-01-31 16:00 - 17:00 | Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar
Martial Hebert is University Professor and Dean of the School of Computer Science at CMU. He was Director of the Robotics Institute from 2015 to 2019 and on the faculty of the Robotics Institute after joining as a postdoc in 1984. His research areas include computer vision, autonomous systems, and machine learning.
Lecture Title: Attacking AI Challenges at the School of Computer Science
Abstract: In this presentation, we will review key research challenges that stand in the way of deploying AI systems in a variety of real-world applications. We will illustrate current progress and approaches toward addressing through examples from current research in the seven departments of the School of Computer Science.They include fundamental questions such as reducing the dependence on curated data, combining symbolic knowledge with statistical techniques, formally validating and characterizing system performance, human modeling for AI interaction, and systematic approaches to dynamically distributed AI components.

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About the A. Nico Habermann Distinguished Lecture Series: Named after Professor A. Nico Habermann, head of the Computer Science Department between 1980 and 1988 and Founding Dean of the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon, the lecture series enables students to engage with prominent faculty and well-known leaders in the field of computer science.

Belonging and Inclusion: A recipe for success
2023-01-31 13:00 - 14:00 | Assembly Area
Join us for a lecture by Dr. Wanda Heading-Grant, Carnegie Mellon University’s Inaugural Vice Provost for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)and Chief Diversity Officer and Distinguished Service Professor Heinz College of Information Systems and Public Policy. Dr. Heading-Grant will be talking about “Belonging and Inclusion: A recipe for success”.
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About the lecture
The presenter takes a page from her cookbook to share key ingredients to successfully practicing and creating belonging and inclusion within higher education and beyond. This presentation describes, outlines, and models the importance of strengthening communities as they advance toward inclusive excellence together. The presenter will share how a sense of belonging, mutual respect, and care for others can foster a global beloved community.
About the speaker
She is an accomplished leader in the areas of diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging, and justice. Throughout Dr. Heading-Grant’s 30-plus year career in higher education, she has established programs, policies, and practices fundamental to the advancement of inclusive excellence and leadership. Her career spans a broad range of academic and administrative roles. Her wealth of professional experience and volunteer involvement on the boards of non-profit organizations and civil rights committees have earned her a reputation as a cultural architect able to build and sustain real and lasting change. She is a change agent.
In 2020, the Vermont Women in Higher Education Association created a new award for Justice named for Dr. Heading-Grant and her years of dedicated leadership and service in fostering DEIB in higher education. She is also the recipient of numerous awards including 2020 Eastern Region Human Resources Excellence Award, College, and University Professional Association for Human Resources (CUPA-HR), 2019 Women Worth Watching Award from Profiles in Diversity Journal, the 2018 University of Vermont Alumni Achievement Award and the 2018 National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education (NADOHE)
She also has certification certificates from Yale School of Management and Harvard University Graduate School Executive Leadership Program and Cornell University Diversity and Inclusion Executive Program. She is a Senior Certified Human Resource Professional.

Dean's Lecture Series: Sheikha Hind bint Hamad Al Thani
2022-09-13 13:00 - 14:00 | Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar
Her Excellency Sheikha Hind bint Hamad Al Thani, Vice Chairperson and CEO of Qatar Foundation will be speaking at Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar as part of the Dean’s Lecture Series on, “A Bitter Bread”. Her Excellency will discuss QF’s mission and the importance of meaningful work. The lecture will take place in-person at Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar.
The Dean’s Lecture Series is the principal forum for eminent industry practitioners and government officials to bring their knowledge and perspectives to Carnegie Mellon, and to broaden students’ understanding of important issues.

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Community Partner Lecture: Password Policies: Do's and don'ts in an internationally diverse environment
2022-03-28 12:00 - 13:00
The CMU-Q Community Partner Lecture Series features discussions by CMU-Q faculty members on pressing topics in business and leadership. This semester, Ryan Riley, associate teaching professor, computer science at CMU-Q will be discussing password policies.
About the lecture:
Most password policy recommendations, such as rules for complexity or frequency of password changes, were designed in a western, English-speaking environment more than 15 years ago. In many cases, these policies were formed based on research on how English-speaking users create passwords and how their accounts are ultimately compromised. This can result in two major issues for password policies enforced by organizations in Qatar today:
1) The policies may be out of date and based on old threat models.
2) The policies do not consider that most employees of the organization are not from a western, English-speaking context.
In this lecture, we will discuss how someone’s cultural and linguistic background impacts how they choose passwords, as well as how organizations can use this information to create better password policies. We will also discuss the most common reasons that user accounts are compromised today, and how that information should impact policies as well.
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Celebrating Women in STEM
2022-02-10 18:00 - 19:30
The Office of Diversity and Climate in partnership with Women in STEM (WiSTEM) invite you to learn about the career journeys of female scientists in Qatar and beyond. A panel of female scientists will discuss their roles in STEM, not only as beneficiaries, but also as agents of change.
More about the panel discussion:
Women accounted for one in three (33%) researchers in 2018. They have achieved parity (in numbers) in life sciences in many countries and even dominate this field, in some cases. However, women remain a minority in digital information technology, computing, physics, mathematics and engineering. We need to recognize the role of women and girls in STEM, not only as beneficiaries, but also as agents of change, including in view of accelerating progress towards achievements in STEM.
Panelists:

Nesrine Affara: Assistant Teaching Professor in Biological Sciences, Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar
Ghizlane Bendriss: Assistant Professor of Biology, Lifestyle Medicine Professional, Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar
Julie Decock: Scientist, Translational Cancer and Immunity Center, Qatar Biomedical Research Center; Joint Assistant Professor, HBKU College of Health and Life Sciences
Judith Gwathmey: Professor of Medicine and Physiology, Boston University School of Medicine
Giselle Reis: Assistant Teaching Professor in Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar

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Community Partner Lecture: Digital economy and Central Bank digital currencies
2021-11-10 12:00 - 13:00
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About the lecture: People spend a good portion of their days on the internet. According to a recent survey, an average user spends 6 hours and 31 minutes per day on the internet. The internet has become the dominant information transfer tool. With the advent of digital currency, it has been evolving into a tool for value transfer. In April 2021, The People’s Bank of China began public testing digital renminbi as the world’s first central bank digital currency (CBDC). In June, Bitcoin became legal tender in El Salvador. In September, Twitter launched a tipping feature that allows followers to send money to their influencers via the Bitcoin network. How does the advent of digital currency affect our lives? What are the benefits of digital currencies? What are the significant challenges for the monetary policymakers?

The Community Partner Lecture is offered by Veli Safak, assistant teaching professor, economics, Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar.

Community Partner Lectures: Decision-making in uncertain times
2021-11-07 12:00 - 13:00
In a world full of uncertainty, effective decision-making can be an extremely complicated task. Surprisingly, the complexity of making the right decision typically increases when decisions are made by groups. This session will provide attendees with examples of mistakes to avoid when making decisions in uncertain environments. We will talk about biases and fallacies that lead to these common mistakes and, more importantly, discuss different ways to create procedures that ensure we avoid falling into these traps.
This Community Partner Lecture is offered by Agustín Indaco, assistant teaching professor, economics at CMU-Q and is designed to equip participants with:

Insights into factors that lead to common mistakes such as groupthink and planning fallacy
Understanding how to properly evaluate decisions made in the past
Strategies for creating processes that ensure that the best decision is made given the available data

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Community Partner Lectures: The power of business analytics
2021-10-13 13:00 - 14:00
The Community Partner Lectures, a virtual series featuring CMU-Q’s faculty experts in the areas of business, science and technology. The next lecture will take place on October 13, 2021.

The Power of Business Analytics
Sameer Mathur, Associate Professor, Marketing and Business Technologies, Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar

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Abstract
According to The Economist, the world’s most valuable resource is no longer oil, but data. Industry leaders claim that “without big data analytics, companies are blind and deaf, wandering out onto the web like deer on a freeway”. The pressing need is “to turn data into information and information into insight”. Just how have major organizations recently used data analytics to influence their strategic and operational decisions? During this community lecture, I will share some inspiring case studies. For example, Netflix saves $1 billion per year on customer retention and offering an individualized user experience with their movie recommendation engine, by harnessing the power of data analytics. What can we learn from such stories? Could we draft an individual plan of action to succeed in this domain? I will attempt to provide a roadmap.

Perspectives Panel: Artificial Intelligence Grand Challenges
2021-10-04 16:30 - 17:30 | Online
The panel will bring together global thought leaders to discuss grand challenges of artificial intelligence. Panelists will provide unique historical perspectives, discuss challenges and progress in the field. The interactive conversation will be led by Ganesh Mani, Adjunct Faculty, School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University (who will be teaching a related course in the Fall for the Qatar and Africa campuses).
Panelists:
Mercy N. Asiedu, Schmidt Science Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Gianni Di Caro, Associate Teaching Professor, Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar
Patrick McSharry, Visiting Professor, Carnegie Mellon University Africa
Francesca Rossi, IBM Fellow, AI Ethics Global Leader, AAAI President-Elect
Dag Spicer, Senior Curator, Computer History Museum
Beverly Woolf, Research Professor, College of Information and Computer Sciences, University of Massachusetts-Amherst.

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A step forward: Qatar elections and the role of women in the Shura Council
2021-09-27 16:30 - 17:30
In November 2020, His Highness the Amir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani announced that Shura Council elections would be taking place for the first time in 2021 and the date was subsequently set to be October 2, 2021. In the list of candidates announced, of the 294 candidates representing different parts of the country, 29 were women. Voters will elect 30 members of the 45-seat council, while His Highness the Amir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani will appoint the remaining 15 members.
Join our panel of two esteemed and well-accomplished women who will put their views forward on the elections in Qatar and the role women play in the Shura Council.
Panelists:
Her Excellency Reem Al-Mansoori
Assistant Undersecretary, Digital Society Development, Ministry of Transport and Communications
Dr. Amal Mohammed Al-Malki
Founding Dean, College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Hamad bin Khalifa University

Moderator:
Maryam Al-Naemi, CMU-Q Alumna, Class of 2018
Project Manager, IT, Qatar Petroleum

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Panel Discussion: Asia Women's Perspectives in the Middle East
2021-04-08 16:30 - 17:30
What does it mean to be an Asian woman living in the Middle East? Hear from students, faculty, and staff from across Education City as they reflect on their experiences living in the Middle East, as well as the continued racism and violence against Asian communities around the world.
Welcome: Angela Ng, Program Director, Student Engagement, CMU-Q
Moderator: LaKisha Tillman, International Education and Student Programming Officer, VCU-Q
Panelists:
Nui Vatanasakdakul, Associate Teaching Professor, Information Systems, CMU-Q
Weilin Li, Student, Biological Sciences, CMU-Q
Sabina Uzakova, Program Coordinator for Student Engagement, TAMU-Q
Sarah Faheem, Interim Director of Student Life and Engagement, VCU-Q
Cut Izza Alyssa, Student, VCU-Q

Webinar Location: https://cmu.zoom.us/s/94500639308
Passcode: [REDACTED]

The Imposter Syndrome
2021-03-22 17:30 - 18:30
CMU-Q, in collaboration with Women in Law MENA, invite you to a panel discussion to learn more about the Imposter Syndrome and how it affects our behavior and decision-making process.
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Welcome by: Annette Vincent, Associate Dean, Diversity and Climate, CMU-Q
Moderated by: Asma Al-Khulaifi, Founding Member, MENA Women in Law
Speakers:
Luicia Ingianni, Commissioner, Employment Standards Office, Qatar Financial Centre
Chantho Creze, President and Founder, Human In Project
Maha Al Ansari, ESO Counsel, Employment Standards Office, Qatar Financial Centre

Leaders in Information Systems: Opportunities for growth in Qatar's ICT sector
2021-03-07 12:00 - 13:00
This edition of Leaders in Information Systems will feature Yazen Al Safi. Yazen is the Director for Digital Industry Development at the Ministry of Transport and Communication in Qatar. He is also a senior management advisor specializing in digital cluster development, digital economy policies, and large-scale transformation programs. Yazen is a trusted advisor to many government leaders and C-level executives in the GCC region. He has over 16 years of experience in leading, managing, and consulting on more than 30 public and private sector transformation projects in the Middle East and Australasia.

For more information, please reach out to Anupama Anilkumar, anupamaa@andrew.cmu.edu or Nui Vatanasakdakul, svatanas@qatar.cmu.edu

Women in Science: Our Journeys
2021-02-11 18:00 - 19:30
Join a panel of female scientists from across Education City and learn more about their journeys in science.
Moderated by Cecile le Roux, associate teaching professor, organization and behavior.
Panelists:

Selma Limam Mansar, Senior Associate Dean, education, CMU-Q
Angela Ng, Program Director of Student Engagement, CMU-Q
Adviti Naik Jana, Postdoctoral Researcher, Qatar Biomedical Research Institute
Borbala Mifsud, Assistant Professor, College of Health and Life Sciences, Hamad Bin Khalifa University
Maya Abi Akl, Physics Lab Coordinator, WFF Co-Chair, TAMU-Q

Community Partner Lectures: Managing Online Teams
2020-12-01 12:00 - 13:00
About the lecture:
The new way of working is remote; working from home (WFH) has become the rule and is no longer the exception. Managers are faced with unique challenges to manage their teams in remote contexts. Establishing connections among team members and creating conditions for team performance have become increasingly complex. This session will provide attendees with current knowledge and insights on factors that contribute to how teams are managed and what enables teams to perform, including how to run effective team meetings. Attendees will leave with actionable strategies to immediately apply to manage their online teams.
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CMU Connections: Peter Scupelli
2020-11-16 16:30 - 17:30
As part of virtual micro courses that will be taking place throughout the semester, Carnegie Mellon faculty will be giving virtual lectures open to the CMU-Q community. Peter Scupelli, Associate Professor, Design at Carnegie Mellon University will be speaking on, “Teaching to Dexign Futures: A vision for a blended learning pedagogy to be deployed at scale”.
Abstract:
Change is exponential in the 21st century. Products and services are developed faster, have shorter lifecycles, and exist in the wider context with global challenges such as climate change and sustainability. Design for the 21st century requires new skills; design educators are challenged to adapt quickly. Many design educators are concerned with urgent problems such as sustainable development and climate change. In this talk, I describe Dexign Futures, a course that teaches students how to align short-term design to long-term timescales. We leverage Future Studies researchers’ work on how to teach students greater agency with in long-term timescale horizons. We describe an effective and efficient blended learning design pedagogy (e.g., combining online and face-to-face learning activities) to engage with new global challenges such as climate change and sustainability. (Dexign) Futures, is a required design studies course for all third-year undergraduate students in the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University. The term “dexign,” refers to an experimental form of design that combines design thinking with futures thinking.

CMU Connections: Mayank Goel
2020-11-11 16:30 - 17:30
As part of virtual micro courses that will be taking place throughout the semester, Carnegie Mellon faculty will be giving virtual lectures open to the CMU-Q community. Mayank Goel, Assistant Teaching Professor at the Institute for Software Research, School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University will be speaking on, “Recognized User’s Actions and Physiology for Health”.
Abstract:
In the last decade, many researchers have explored the timely detection of mental health changes using sensors in the user’s environment. This is mostly accomplished using wearables; especially in solutions that are deployed in the real world. Wearables are sensor-laden, extremely personal, almost always on the user. The challenge is that the sensors on most wearables only provide a coarse estimate of a user’s actions and behavior. The ideal sensing system would be inexpensive, use existing sensors, be plug-and-play, and able to be deployed with no training or calibration. The talk will present our efforts towards building a general-purpose and flexible activity and physiology inference system that relies on an ecosystem of smart devices while keeping deployment, training, and user burden to a minimum.

CMU Connections: Colin Clarke
2020-11-09 16:30 - 17:30
As part of virtual micro courses that will be taking place throughout the semester, Carnegie Mellon faculty will be giving virtual lectures open to the CMU-Q community. Colin Clarke, Assistant Teaching Professor at the Institute for Politics and Strategy at Carnegie Mellon University will be speaking on, “Seeking stability in a turbulent Middle East”.
Abstract:
So much has changed in a region that for a long time, could be described as sclerotic. Taking stock of where things stand in the Middle East in 2020, how did we get here, and perhaps more importantly, where are we headed next? Dr. Colin P. Clarke will begin his lecture by providing a brief overview of major events in the Middle East, beginning at the end of the Cold War, moving through the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and fast-forwarding to the Arab Spring uprisings that began in earnest in 2011. The Syrian civil war will be used as a central case study, although he will also cover events elsewhere throughout the region, including Egypt, Libya, and Iran. Dr. Clarke’s lecture will present a comprehensive synopsis of the current state of geopolitics in the Middle East, describing in detail the dizzying array of alliances and rivalries and how these have shifted during the course of the war.

CMU Connections: DJ Brasier
2020-11-02 16:30 - 17:30
As part of virtual micro courses that will be taking place throughout the semester, Carnegie Mellon faculty will be giving virtual lectures open to the CMU-Q community. DJ Brasier, Associate Teaching Professor and Assistant Department Head for Graduate Affairs in Biological Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University will be speaking on, “What is the optimal distribution of assets in an online learning module”.
Abstract:
In this study we investigated the optimal placement of animations and practice and feedback exercises with respect to each other and to static text and graphics in an online DNA replication module. We randomly assigned students in a first-semester introductory biology course for freshman biology majors and non-majors to one of four online modules with animations and practice exercises (assets) either embedded with the text & images or saved until the end after all the text & images. Although we expected to find that embedding assets with text & images would improve learning outcomes, we were surprised to find that outcomes did not change with the location of these assets with respect to the text & static images. Instead, we found that co-location of exercises with animations were correlated with the biggest student learning gains, independent of where these assets appeared relative to the static text and static images. This held true both for immediate posttest scores and delayed application questions on a midterm exam. Our findings could have potential implications for how to best design online learning modules that feature multiple assets.

CMU Connections: Ignacio Arana
2020-10-29 16:30 - 17:30
As part of virtual micro courses that will be taking place throughout the semester, Carnegie Mellon faculty will be giving virtual lectures open to the CMU-Q community. Ignacio Arana, Assistant Teaching Professor at the Institute for Politics and Strategy at Carnegie Mellon University will be speaking on, “Challenges to Study the Politics of the Arabian Gulf from a Comparative Perspective”.
Abstract:
Comparativists face multiple challenges to conduct research, including measuring complex concepts, endogenous causal relations, and controlling for all the relevant variables that explain political outcomes. There are added difficulties to study the Arabian Gulf, such as low-quality data and limited access to such data. These challenges, nonetheless, can be increasingly overcome due to the ongoing data revolution in the social sciences and growing interdisciplinary research. How fast this will happen is likely to depend on the position that governments, research institutions, and multilateral organizations take.

Distinguished IS Lecture: Cracking the digital ceiling: Women in computing around the world
2020-10-28 12:00 - 13:00
Jeria Quesenberry, Teaching Professor of Information Systems and the Associate Dean of Faculty in the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University, will be the first speaker in the Distinguished IS Lecture series. She will be discussing “Cracking the Digital Ceiling: Women in computing around the world”.
Click here to attend!
Abstract:
Is computing just for men? Are men and women suited to different careers? In this talk I will present global perspectives that challenge these commonly held western views, perpetuated as explanations for women’s low participation in computing. I will also examine the obstacles and catalysts within various cultures and environments to help those interested in improving the situation understand where they might look to make changes that could impact women’s participation in their classrooms, companies, and administrations.
Short Bio:
Jeria is an Teaching Professor of Information Systems and the Associate Dean of Faculty in the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University. Her research interests are directed at the study of cultural influences on information technology students and professionals, including topics of social inclusion, broadening participation, career values, organizational interventions, and work-life balance. Her work has appeared in many leading journals and conferences including the Information Systems Journal, European Journal on Information Systems, Data Base for Advance in Information Systems, and the International Conference on Information System. Jeria teaches in the areas of global systems, social informatics, strategic value of information systems, and web design and development. Prior to joining Carnegie Mellon University, she earned a Doctorate of Philosophy degree in Information Sciences and Technology from the Pennsylvania State University and previously worked as a consultant at Accenture. Jeria’s book can be found through: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/cracking-the-digital-ceiling-carol-frieze/1130935055

Leaders in Information Systems: Southeast Asia Innovation and Entrepreneurial Principles
2020-10-27 12:00 - 13:00
The Leaders in Information Systems student club is pleased to welcome Dr. Kid Supachai Parchariyanon, Co-Founder and CEO of RISE Corporate Innovation Powerhouse, Thailand, to their first lecture of the semester.
In 2016, Dr. Kid Supachai Parchariyanon founded RISE – Corporate Innovation Powerhouse to work with over 400+ large conglomerates and governments in Southeast Asia to innovate faster through its unique corporate accelerator and intrapreneur programs. RISE is now one of the largest accelerators in SEA with 2,000+startups having graduated from the program and combined valuation of over $2billion.
For more information, please contact Nui Vatanasakdakul.
To attend, please click here.

CMU Connections: Ramesh Krishnamurti
2020-10-05 16:30 - 17:30
As part of virtual micro courses that will be taking place throughout the semester, Carnegie Mellon faculty will be giving virtual lectures open to the CMU-Q community. Ramesh Krishnamurti, Professor, Computational Design at Carnegie Mellon University will be speaking on, “Generative Machines for Design”.
Abstract:
Computational generative machines are constructs that, with given proper input and a program, can automatically synthesize design alternatives. In this talk I introduce a framework to organize such generative machines under a unified conceptual space based on: parameters, rules and agents. We introduced this framework in a new course at Carnegie Mellon University to support the development of interactive generative systems with expressive design spaces. This has resulted in interesting work and insightful feedback from the students. This talk recounts our experience.

CMU Connections: Doha Project
2020-09-23 16:30 - 17:30
As part of virtual micro courses that will be taking place throughout the semester, Carnegie Mellon faculty will be giving virtual lectures open to the CMU-Q community. Dylan Vitone, Associate Professor, School of Design, Carnegie Mellon University will be speaking on his “Doha Project”.
Abstract:
An Associate Professor in the School of Design at CMU Pittsburgh, Dylan has been visiting our campus and Qatar for over a decade now. Most recently he has taught micro courses in fall 2019 and 2020. Along the way he has documented with his camera changes in the city of Doha as he experienced it. In this lecture he will be discussing some of his photographs and the story they tell of a place. See the attached poster for more details.
