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The details: Nikita joined the UF CISE department as a Senior Certificate student, on an exchange program for senior undergrads at select institutions in India, in 2015. She entered our MS program and joined my research lab. Her love of research blossomed and she decided to stay for a Ph.D. In the Human-Centered Computing (HCC) Ph.D. program, Nikita learned to design technology from a “people-first” perspective. Nikita graduated with her Ph.D. in 2021.
Dissertation project/topic: Nikita worked on the TIDRC framework during her MS, codifying the wide range of evidence-based design recommendations for children’s touchscreen apps into a practitioner-friendly guide; and she worked on the TIDESS project as the foundation of her PhD, investigating the hand and body gestures, physical space usage, and learning talk involved in collaborative interactive science learning experiences.
Committee members (besides me): Dr. Jaime Ruiz, Dr. Christina Gardner-McCune, Dr. Sharon L. Chu, Dr. Kathryn A. Stofer.
Where are they now: Nikita is in her fourth year as faculty at the University of Illinois at Chicago in computer science. She directs the Engaging Learning and Creativity Interaction Technology (ELiCIT) Lab, where they design novel human-computer interactions and interfaces for education and creativity support for children and family groups.
Top publications: Nikita’s top-cited paper from her time in the INIT Lab with me is the TIDRC framework paper published at the ACM International Conference on Interaction Design & Children (IDC) in 2019, with 66 citations as of today. Her top-cited paper as a faculty member so far is an interdisciplinary collaboration in the International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders from 2023, which already has 17 citations!
Proud advisor moment: Attending the IDC 2023 conference in Chicago, Illinois, where Nikita attended as a faculty member, took me to breakfast, and showed me her research lab. 🥰 (Bonus: traveling to India in 2022 where Nikita’s parents generously hosted me!)
We can’t wait to see what Nikita does next! ❤️
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