Society of Columbia Graduates

2016, Columbia Engineering

Today, the Society of Columbia Graduates honors you for your exceptional teaching accomplishments and for your important contributions and leadership role in designing and implementing curricula that are both engaging to computer science majors, and to undergraduates from other majors who learn to use computers in new and innovative ways.

You earned your B.S. (1991) and your M.S (1994) in Aerospace Engineering from the University of California, Los Angeles, followed by your M.A. (1997) and your Ph.D. (2000) in Applied Mathematics from Johns Hopkins University. Your commitment to undergraduate education, your enthusiasm and your outstanding achievements have earned you numerous accolades, including a Columbia SEAS Alumni Association Distinguished Faculty Teaching Award in 2002 and a Department of Computer Science Faculty Teaching Award in 2009.

As Chair of the Computer Science Department’s Academic Committee, you serve many vital roles including overseeing all undergraduate advising, maintaining and developing undergraduate programs within the Department and recruiting outstanding undergraduate and graduate students to serve as teaching assistants. Those who are chosen for this role feel deeply honored to be a part of your initiatives and to be beneficiaries of your exemplary mentorship.

Your commitment to the instruction of computer science has helped position this major at the center of Columbia’s undergraduate experience and you has opened the door to this increasingly essential fund of knowledge for thousands of students by creating a more inviting, inclusive and engaging discipline for all who pursue computer science. At the start of the Fall 2015 semester, there were over 600 undergraduate computer science majors at Columbia, and this semester, enrollment in the department’s 1000 and 3000-level courses totals upwards of 4000 students. Your students describe you as a passionate teacher, witty, and in command of your lectures.

Widely recognized as the “face of Computer Science at Columbia”, you have played an instrumental role in designing and teaching introductory computer science courses, creating effective initiatives to attract more women to computer science, and along with a Provost’s Hybrid Learning Course Redesign Award, have brought many distinguished faculty from other disciplines to teach in an innovative new course, “Computing in Context”, in which undergraduates integrate learning about computer science in the context of applications within their own major.

In 2008, you co-founded the Department’s emerging Scholars Program in order to attract more women to computer science at Columbia. This innovative peer-led program is comprised of a weekly seminar where Computer Science majors, primarily women, lead small groups of freshman and sophomores in problem solving and programming exercises outside of the classroom. You also provide valuable service to the University as an important member of several SEAS and University committees, including the SEAS Committee on Instruction, the Senate Online Learning Task Force and the Provostial Academic Advisory Committee on Online Learning.

In recognition of your outstanding accomplishments as a gifted and inspirational teacher, and for your most important contributions to shaping computer science education at Columbia, the Society of Columbia Graduates is honored to present you with its 2016 Great Teacher Award.