Invited Speakers
Mark Guzdial
College of Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology
| Biography | Mark Guzdial is a Professor in the School of Interactive Computing in the College of Computing at Georgia Institute of Technology ("Georgia Tech"). He is a learning scientist who focuses on computing education research and collaborative technologies. His Ph.D. is in Education and Computer Science from the University of Michigan in 1993. He has authored and co-authored several textbooks, including two on Media Computation--an approach to introducing computing in the context of media manipulation. He is the Director of Project "Georgia Computes!" whose goal is improving computing education and increasing diversity in computing across the state of Georgia. |
| Abstract |
Meeting computing needs across campus Computing has grown in importance throughout our society and academia. The real importance of computing is not in providing applications. Computing provides the metaphors, notations, and mechanisms for describing processes that have become critical in science and other disciplines. Several years ago, Georgia Tech decided that all students on our campus need to become computationally literate and able to use algorithmic thinking in their disciplines. In the last decade, we have struggled to make that work. We have learned how computing is valued and used in different disciplines. Our challenge has been to motivate undergraduates to pursue their computing education, even if they are not in a computing major. This talk describes some of that history, our current best efforts, and results from studies of these classes. |
Joel A. Slayton
Director of the CADRE Laboratory for New Media, San Jose State University
C5: the Information Cartel
| Biography | Joel Slayton is an artist, writer and researcher. He is Director of the CADRE Laboratory for New Media, an interdisciplinary academic program in the School of Art and Design at San Jose State University. CADRE, established in 1984, is dedicated to the development of experimental applications involving information technology and art. Joel Slayton is also Founder and Director of FUSE: collaborations, a new artists research residency program in cooperation with the Montalvo Arts Center in Saratoga, California. Professor Slayton is on the Executive Boards of ZERO1 and LEONARDO ISAST. He was Academic Chair for ISEA2006 (International Symposium for Electronic Art). He is the Executive Editor of SWITCH, CADRE's on-line journal of new media discourse and practice. Initiated in1995, SWITCH has presented 19 volumes that have addressed themes such as Network Culture, Artificial Life, Art and the Military, Sound Culture, Cyber-feminism, Art as Network, Art as Database, New Media Art Centers, Social/Networks Collaborative Models, and Social Computing. Joel Slayton served as Editor and Chief of the Leonardo-MIT Press Book Series from 1999-2005. Professor Slayton's research explores social software, cooperation models and network ontology. Papers include Social Software; Entailment Mesh, The Re-Purpose of Information, and The Ontology of Organization as System. Joel Slayton's artworks have been featured in exhibitions internationally. Joel Slayton is President and founder of C5 Corporation. C5 is a hybrid form of authorship intersecting research, corporate culture and artistic enterprise. |
| Abstract |
Transdisciplinarity Artists are uniquely skilled in creating works that attract, stimulate, provoke, and inform. In many ways it is the role of the arts to operate at the cultural frontier so as to identify and critically address the important issues of our times. This includes but is not limited to globalization, sustainability, censorship, human centered design, social responsibility, and the next generation of cultural production. Experimentation by artists also serves to shape a public understanding of the possibilities and responsibilities of technical and engineering innovation. It is fair to say they are often engaged with the same technologies and problems that have emerged that are central to innovation in computing: including data mining, artificial intelligence, simulation, knowledge engineering, sensor networks, etc. From land use, urban planning and architecture to cinema, information visualization and mapping -- artists are using computing tools to communicate complex issues through new forms of expression. This presentation will consider some of the subject matter, issues and examples of work by artists involved with the CADRE Laboratory, C5 Corporation, FUSE: CADRE/Montalvo Artist Research Residency and 01SJ 2008: A Global Festival of Art on the Edge. |