ATLAS & Program Updates for February & March
ATLAS’ new research labs are open! As many of you know, over the winter break ATLAS embarked on a rapid renovation project that reconfigured the second floor, creating two new research spaces that are now home to ATLAS faculty members Ben Shapiro and Dan Szafir, and their graduate and undergraduate research assistants. Learn more about the Laboratory for Playful Computation (Shapiro) and the Interactive Robotics and Novel Technologies (IRON) Lab (Szafir) here. Both labs will participate in ATLAS Expo on Wednesday, Apr. 27. Mark your calendars and join us to see student projects and the exciting work underway in these new spaces.
Technology, Arts & Media continues to flourish, with 957 declared TAM students this spring. Enrollment for the certificate program is 735, while the minor has a whopping 171, making it one of the largest minors on campus. The newly launched BS-TAM major currently includes 51 students, and we are actively recruiting incoming transfer students and prospective freshmen through numerous information and admissions programs.
In addition to hiring new faculty and building new lab spaces, we’re recruiting graduate students into ATLAS’ interdisciplinary Ph.D. and master’s program, which now includes a Creative Technology + Design (CTD) track, along with Information & Communication Technologies for Development (ICTD). These efforts build a stronger graduate and research community a nd develop important pipelines for advancing new ideas and thought leadership. The new labs, and others to be created with additional faculty members, blend learning in student communities, serve as a springboard for new ideas, and are already attracting grants from government and industry.
News & Recent Events:
CU Global Entrepreneurs in Residence (GEIR) is a new campus program supported by local venture capitalist Brad Feld to support student and faculty innovators and entrepreneurs. Three visiting entrepreneurs are working with the university community, encouraging them to act on innovative ideas. The GEIRs include Nigel Sharp, who has a background in engineering and digital technology. We’ve met with Nigel several times now to get his thoughts on some of our ideas. He has a particular affinity for ATLAS and TAM and we’re thrilled to have his input on several projects and as a resource for the ATLAS community. More>>
ATLAS hosted the 24-hour women’s hackathon T9Hacks on Feb 20–21, thanks to the efforts of ATLAS PhD student Brittany Kos, ATLAS Mobile Maker coordinator and CU undergrad Jessie Albarian, TAM Instructor Aileen Pierce and many other volunteers and sponsors. A key goal was to attract broader involvement of women in hackathons through an event that specifically invited women’s participation (without excluding men). The strategy clearly worked! While most hackathons are typically 10 – 15 percent women, 60 percent of T9Hacks participants were female. And T9Hacks rallied the community in other ways too, attracting more than ten industry sponsors and several TAM alumni, who served as event mentors. Read more in the Daily Camera.
The first Art @ ATLAS project was completed spring, the north stairwell in the Roser ATLAS building was adorned by graffiti artist Ahol Sniffs Glue. Wanting more art (and less bare concrete) another mural was painted in February by multimedia artist Kelsey Montague on the wall by the landing between the first and second floors. Check out the latest installation, and share it with your friends on social media—Kelsey’s art is specifically designed to be interactive.
ATLAS Speaker Series welcomed multimedia artists Anna Dumitriu and Alex May for a duo of talks on Feb. 8. Anna’s work fuses craft, technology and bioscience to explore our relationship and connection to the microbial world. Alex works in a wide range of digital technologies, including video mapping, interactive installations, full-size humanoid robots, performance and video art. Our guests led two workshops for ATLAS students: Infective Textiles and using microbiology as a creative medium, and Video Mapping software Painting With Light. What’s Up Next?
The ATLAS Calendar has a comprehensive list of our upcoming events, including several TAM Workshops (open to all) and the laptop orchestra, BLOrk’s Dance Party on March 5. Looking further ahead, be sure to mark your calendars to join us for another ATLAS Expo on Wednesday, April 27, 5–6:30 p.m. showcasing student creative work, installations and research.
Faculty & Staff News:
ATLAS Faculty Fellow and CMAP Director, Michael Theodore’s exhibit, Supraliminal, recently closed a run at David B Smith Gallery in Denver, but not before getting a terrific review in the Denver Post. Theodore’s project also included the technical contributions of ATLAS PhD student Abshishek Narula, who is also teaching a TAM class on 3D modeling, printing and animation.
ATLAS Director Mark D Gross attended the ACM conference on Tangible Embedded Interaction in Eindhoven, the Netherlands where ATLAS PhD students Abhishek Narula and Hyunjoo Oh presented “Crafting Mechatronic Percussion with Everyday Materials” (co-authored with PhD student Jiffer Harriman, ATLAS Faculty Fellow Mike Eisenberg, and Sherry Hsi). Explore more about Paper Mechatronics.
ATLAS Faculty member Ben Shapiro traveled to Germany to participate in the first ever Dagstuhl Seminar on computer science education. The seminar focused on assessment of learning, and he was part of a breakout group focused on using experience design techniques to create assessments that better serve learners.
ATLAS Associate Director Jill Dupré moderated another Entrepreneurs Unplugged conversation about leadership, innovation and entrepreneurship with Sherisse Hawkins, co-founder of Boulder startup Beneath The Ink (co-founded by TAM alum Alex Milewski). Both Sherisse and Alex have been active with the TAM program and visit ATLAS frequently to share ideas and input with our students. We introduce ATLAS’ first post-doctoral fellow Hilary A. Dwyer, who will work in association with ATLAS faculty member Ben Shapiro and ATLAS’ Laboratory for Playful Computation. Hilary earned her PhD in Teaching and Learning from UC Santa Barbara and is committed to understanding the process of learning across STEM content areas and how technology intersects with identity, culture and learning. ATLAS PhD Round Up:
PhD candidate Calvin Pohawpatchoko’s article, Developing a Native Digital Voice: Technology and Inclusivity in Museums will appear in the journal, Museum Anthropology. Co-authors include Chip Colwell of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, Jami Powell and Jerry Lassos.
PhD students Abhishek Narula and Jiffer Harriman will travel to Georgia Tech next week for the Guthman Musical Instrument competition to demonstrate and perform with instruments created for last fall’s Solidnoise event.
On March 7, Harriman installs an interactive kinetic sculpture in the entrance of the main Boulder Public Library. The piece, Solarophone, turns the glass and steel structure of the atrium into a musical instrument that responds to light, allowing visitors to play it by casting shadows on a control surface. Join Jiffer for an opening reception on Saturday, March 12, 6 p.m.
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