Thu, 08/20/2020

HCDE Assistant Professor Nadya Peek has received a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to research methods for testing and verification in distributed production. Support from the award enables Peek and students in her research lab, Machine Agency, to research what quality control could look like for production with widespread and distributed digital fabrication equipment. Peek asks, “If open source hardware designs can easily be widely shared, how do we ensure that they can also safely be widely produced?”

Thu, 08/20/2020 | Columbia University Press Blog

Dr. Zakiya Hanafi, an affiliate faculty member in HCDE, has spent the last decade of her career translating works of philosophy from Italian and French into English. In a new blog post on the Columbia University Press Blog, Dr. Hanafi shares the observations that inspired her to become a translator and discusses why translation is so important today.

Tue, 08/18/2020 | College of Engineering

Since 2013, STARS — the Washington STate Academic RedShirt program — has provided the extra support that underserved Washington students need to succeed in engineering. HCDE alumna Tuyen Truong (BS, '17), now a product designer at Dropbox, reflects on how she's using her degree and how STARS helped get her there.

Mon, 08/03/2020

The climate change impacts of drought, wildfire, and extreme flooding can destabilize the daily work of scientists. In Anticipating Future Environments, HCDE Research Scientist Shana Hirsch tells the story of how ecological restorationists working to recover salmon in the Columbia River Basin are adapting their scientific practices to deal with climate change.

Thu, 07/23/2020

Julie Kientz, Professor & Chair of HCDE, and her husband Professor Shwetak Patel are establishing an endowment to support HCDE students facing unexpected financial hardship.

Thu, 07/16/2020

Scientific research increasingly relies on collaboration across many different areas of expertise. Challenges arise for scientists when they need to do convergent research that requires translation and use of diverse expertise, tools, and analytic techniques. HCDE Professors Charlotte Lee and David Ribes have received a $500,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to study how scientists collaborate across different fields and areas of expertise.

Mon, 07/13/2020

In the wake of COVID-19 outbreaks, organizations large and small made a sudden shift to remote working to support social distancing. HCDE Associate Professor Charlotte Lee has received a rapid research (RAPID) grant from the National Science Foundation to study how organizations and individuals are adapting to remote work, and to develop guidance about how to support such shifts in the future.

Mon, 07/13/2020

In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, American families are urgently adapting to new ways of working, managing child and elder care, and facilitating remote learning experiences. HCDE Professors Julie Kientz and Sean Munson, together with the iSchool's Jason Yip and Alexis Hiniker, have received a rapid-response research grant from the NSF to study the pandemic’s effect on family life and the role of technology.

Mon, 07/13/2020

HCDE Associate Professor Kate Starbird and her collaborators with the UW’s Center for an Informed Public received a rapid-response research (RAPID) grant from the National Science Foundation to study how scientific knowledge, expertise, data, and communication affect the spread and correction of online misinformation about an emerging pandemic.

Mon, 07/13/2020

HCDE Research Scientist Dr. Scott Miles is on an interdisciplinary team of researchers awarded a one-year Rapid-Response Research (RAPID) grant from the National Science Foundation to study the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Seattle region.

Wed, 07/08/2020

HCDE Research Scientist Dr. Sonia Savelli has received an NSF rapid-response grant to study how people make decisions based on complex risk information, and how communication about risk can help people make more informed decisions.

Tue, 07/07/2020

HCDE Associate Professor Kate Starbird was interviewed by Seattle Times about the spread of misinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic and leading up to the 2020 election.

Fri, 06/26/2020

Dr. Shana Lee Hirsch, a postdoctoral research scientist in HCDE, will work with PMEC to understand and facilitate university-industry collaboration in the marine energy industry in the US.

Wed, 06/24/2020

K-12 Outreach in HCDE is constantly evolving, and our department’s efforts in this area have been expanding. In order to understand how our program has changed over the years, let’s take a look back at its journey to date.

Tue, 06/23/2020

Dr. Elin Björling, senior research scientist and lecturer in HCDE, has received an Innovation Gap Fund grant from CoMotion and the Population Health Initiative. The one-year, $50,000 award will support Björling and Maya Cakmak, assistant professor in the Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, to develop a robust prototype for their Project EMAR social robot project to enable school implementation studies in the fall.

Fri, 06/19/2020

Department alumnus Phil Spencer delivered the Graduation Address at the HCDE 2020 Graduation & Awards Ceremony. Spencer spoke about the power of technology to bring people together, and the critical role today's graduates will play in designing a more just future.

Wed, 06/17/2020

Nadya Peek, an assistant professor in the Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering, is one of 35 innovators recognized in the annual MIT Technology Review "35 Innovators Under 35."

Tue, 06/16/2020

Dr. Sarah Coppola is joining the HCDE faculty as an Assistant Teaching Professor in September 2020. Coppola comes to HCDE from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, where she is a postdoctoral fellow in Human Factors Engineering.

Thu, 06/11/2020

HCDE welcomed alumna Tamara Adlin, President of Adlin, Inc, for a hybrid "AMA" + words of wisdom on job salaries, negotiation, and titles. Tamara is a C-level strategy and user experience consultant to startups and companies that want to behave more like startups.

Wed, 06/10/2020

HCDE held a virtual Capstone Showcase on Monday, June 8, where graduating master's and undergraduate students presented their final capstone projects to the community. View all 2020 capstone projects here.

Wed, 06/10/2020

Today HCDE participated in the #ShutDownAcademia / #ShutDownSTEM strikes in support of racial justice. Using the time to reflect on our practices and goals, the HCDE faculty generated a list of both long-term and short-term actions we are taking in support of becoming an anti-racist community. Read a message from HCDE Professor & Chair Julie Kientz.

Tue, 06/09/2020

HCDE is proud to present the recipients of our 2020 Student Awards of Excellence. The HCDE faculty annually recognize outstanding undergraduate and graduate students who demonstrate excellence in the areas of academics, leadership, and innovation. 

Mon, 06/08/2020

HCDE Master's students Jazz Ang, Ana Liu, and Della Sigrest received a fellowship from Jumpstart, a recruiting platform for students and companies in tech, to reimagine communication between students and employers in the time of online meetings.

Fri, 05/29/2020

Emerita Professor Jan Spyridakis is receiving the department's 2020 Myron L. White Award. Better known as "The Mikey," named after the co-founder of the department, it is presented annually by the faculty to a leader in the field and a dedicated friend of the department. The award will be presented at the HCDE Graduation & Awards Ceremony on June 9, 2020.

Fri, 05/29/2020

HCDE announces that Phil Spencer, Executive Vice President of Gaming at Microsoft and department alumnus, will deliver the guest commencement address at the HCDE Graduation & Awards Ceremony on Tuesday, June 9, 2020.