The strength of the College of IST is demonstrated through the successes and accomplishments of its students, faculty, alumni, and programs. Read more about how the college and its people are driving innovative change and taking on the challenges of the Information Age.
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The Applied Research Laboratory at Penn State has awarded a Walker Graduate Assistantship to Hope Stylios, a graduate student majoring in cybersecurity analytics and operations in the College of Information Sciences and Technology.
Teams from the Competitive Cyber Security Organization in the Penn State College of IST won first and third place at the 2024 Social Engineering Competition at Temple University.
Penn State’s Center for Socially Responsible Artificial Intelligence announced the winners of its first-ever “Fake-a-thon.” The competition, held April 1-5, invited Penn Staters to use generative AI tools like ChatGPT to create fake news stories that then underwent scrutiny for clues during the two-part challenge.
Where: Altoona Mirror, “Ripple effect: Local agencies ramp up security after state, national cyberattacks on water supplies”
Who: David Hozza, assistant teaching professor in the College of IST
The Penn State College of IST held its first capstone showcase on April 26 in the Westgate Building at University Park. The event was co-sponsored by the IST Alumni Society Board.
Lee Giles, David Reese Professor of Information Sciences and Technology, and Jack Carroll, distinguished professor, were included in the Research.com 2023 Ranking of Best Scientists in Computer Science, published earlier this month.
Professor Dongwon Lee, acting interim associate dean for research and director of doctoral programs in the College of IST, participated in a virtual National Academies workshop on April 11.
A story by Sanjana Gautam, a doctoral student of informatics in the College of IST, appeared in Medium on April 27.
Six Penn State student teams using artificial intelligence for good to solve real-world problems were selected by a panel of judges to share a prize pool of $17,000 to continue to develop their projects further as winners of the 2024 Nittany AI Challenge.
IST Alumni Society Board member Madison Oliver won the Rising Star Award at the 2024 CIO of the Year Awards from the Pittsburgh Technology Council.
As part of our regular "We Are!" feature, we recognize 16 Penn Staters who have gone above and beyond what’s asked of them in their work at the University.
The inaugural Penn State AI Week event brought students, staff and faculty across the University together through a poster session, workshops, contests and panel discussions to discuss artificial intelligence in academia and around the world.
A $20 million grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation will support the establishment and operation of the National Synthesis Center for Emergence in the Molecular and Cellular Sciences at Penn State. The center will enable research that uses existing, publicly available data to glean new insights about how complex biological systems, such as cells, emerge from simpler molecules.
Carolyn “Tomi” Oluwaseun-Apo, a fourth-year student majoring in human-centered design and development in the College of IST, earned an honorable mention for the University Libraries Undergraduate Research Award: Excellence in Information Literacy. She received a cash prize for her poster, “A Smarter Mirror for a Smarter Student: Designing a Smart Mirror for Student Productivity and Well-Being.”
For the first time, the College of IST sent students to the national Women in Cybersecurity (WiCyS) Conference. The event was held April 11-13 at the Gaylord Opryland Resort in Nashville, and student attendance was funded by IST’s Office of Student Engagement The annual WiCyS Conference welcomes cybersecurity professionals, students and organizations, according to its website.
Where: WTAJ-TV, Penn State students showcase AI at All-Sports Museum.
Who: Students from the College of IST’s entrepreneurship and innovation, led by associate teaching professor Betsy Campbell.
Andrea Tapia has been named the permanent dean of the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology, effective May 1. Tapia has held the role in an interim capacity since August 2023.
Hillmer Chona, a master’s degree student in the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology, was invited by the Devnexus Conference to serve as a panelist at the Java Users Group Leaders Summit in Atlanta.
Where: Penn State News, Infrastructure, consultation for multi-site studies using electronic health data
Who: Vasant Honavar, professor in the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology (IST), director of the Center for Artificial Intelligence Foundations and Scientific Applications (CENSAI), and informatics co-lead of the Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (CTSI)
More than 5 million central lines are placed in patients who need prolonged drug delivery, such as those undergoing cancer treatments, in the United States every year, yet the common procedure can lead to a bevy of complications in almost a million of those cases. Penn State researchers developed an robotic simulation training program to provide trainee physicians with more practice on the procedure.
Katie Moussouris, a leading researcher and entrepreneur in cybersecurity and vulnerability disclosure, will present the 2024 spring commencement address for the College of IST.
The David and Kathy Hozza Learning Assistant Award recognizes learning assistants for their exemplary commitment to student learning, inclusive teaching practices, leadership and innovative perspectives and ideas that advance the College of Information Sciences and Technology's commitment to teaching and learning. The inaugural awards ceremony was held on April 16 at Reese's Cafe in the Westgate Building at University Park.
The Penn State College of IST has named Andrew Maier and Connor Morton as student marshals for the spring 2024 commencement ceremony, which will be held at 9 a.m. on May 4 at Pegula Ice Arena.
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — On March 23, students from the College of IST enjoyed an educational and cultural trip to Washington, D.C. The students toured the heartbreaking and inspiring National Museum of African American History and Culture, took in the beauty and fragrance of the abundant cherry blossoms and experienced an undercover mission at the International Spy Museum.
Where: The Washington Post, “As the internet gets scarier, more parents keep their kids’ photos offline”
Who: Priya Kumar, assistant professor in the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology (IST)
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Sixty-seven students in the College of Information Sciences and Technology on the University Park campus and at World Campus are among the recipients of Penn State’s most prestigious University-wide undergraduate academic awards. In the college, 51 earned the President Walker Award, 9 earned the President Sparks Award, and 7 earned the Evan Pugh Scholar Award. Awards are determined at the beginning of the calendar year for the prior calendar year.
Where: Voice of America (VoA), “Iraq’s Christians cancel Easter celebrations to support Cardinal Sako”
Who: Greg Kruczek, assistant teaching professor in the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology (IST)
The College of IST is marking its 25th anniversary with a Penn State Berkey Creamery flavor sponsorship, named “IST Celebrates 25 Death By Chocolate," chocolate ice cream with chocolate flakes, fudge pieces and chocolate swirl.
Amazon employee Joseph Bourdon chose to get his security and risk analysis degree online through Penn State World Campus, and his tuition was fully funded through the Amazon Career Choice initiative. The program covers tuition for employees of Amazon who are seeking undergraduate degrees.
Penn State alumni Julie A. Cerrito, Melanie R. McReynolds, Scott Michael Robertson and Vivian Briones Valenty were honored on March 23 as the 2024 Graduate School Alumni Society Award recipients.
Penn State's Competitive Cyber Security Organization took second place at the regional finals of the Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition on March 23 at Prince George's Community College.
Vasant Honavar, professor in the College of Information Sciences and Technology, Huck Chair in Biomedical Data Sciences and Artificial Intelligence, and founding director of the Center for Artificial Intelligence Foundations and Scientific Applications (CENSAI), was featured in the Winter/Spring 2024 issue of Edge Discovery magazine.
IST students Mehul Aggarwal and Mihir Kulkarni won third place and $5,000 in the 2024 Invent Penn State Inc.U competition. The pair cofounded Marble, which is revolutionizing the journaling experience by creating a dynamic, personalized, and interactive platform to overcome the hurdle of sustaining the journaling habit and improving mental health.
Into-Int, an idea for an interactive, educational app that teaches online safety habits to kids, was the winning idea in the 2024 Bardusch Family IdeaMakers Challenge, held March 19 during Penn State Startup Week powered by PNC.
Starting April Fools’ Day, Penn State’s Center for Socially Responsible Artificial Intelligence (CSRAI) will host “Fake-a-thon,” a five-day competition to better understand the role of generative AI in the creation and detection of fake news. The event challenges participants to use generative AI to write believable fake news stories and is open to all members of the University community with a valid Penn State email address.
Penn State alumni Angela Liberto and Josh Rex have made a commitment to establish the Liberto Rex Dean’s Advisory Board Matching Scholarship in the College of Information Sciences and Technology, where they both earned their undergraduate degrees.
Siyu Wu, a graduate student pursuing a doctorate in information in the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology, was selected to attend the Future Leaders Summit hosted by the Michigan Institute for Data Science (MIDAS). The event offers outstanding graduate students, postdocs and early-career faculty from around the U.S.
The inaugural lecture, set for 6:30 p.m. March 26 in the Hintz Family Alumni Center at University Park, features a conversation with Sybrina Fulton, racial justice activist and mother of Trayvon Martin, a Black youth whose 2012 death helped spark the early #BlackLivesMatter movement. The lecture is free and open to the public, but advance registration is required.
Eleven Penn State student teams using artificial intelligence (AI) for good to solve real-world problems in the areas of health, environment, education and humanitarianism are in the final phase of 2024 Nittany AI Challenge.
Liam Geyer, a third-year student majoring in cybersecurity analytics and operations in the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology, earned second place and $1,000 at the Deloitte Foundation Cyber Threat Competition, held Feb. 15-17 at Deloitte University.
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — The Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology (IST) hosted its third annual Be You in Tech Summit on February 7 at the Eric J. Barron Innovation Hub in State College. The event, supported by a grant from the RSM US Foundation, welcomed students, corporate partners alumni to celebrate the diversity in the technology industry.
Researchers from the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology created a new method to streamline medical summarization, a process that uses artificial intelligence to condense complex patient information.
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Six students from the Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology (IST) were among the 700 dancers at THON 2024. The event raised a record-breaking $16.9 million, surpassing last year’s record by nearly $2 million.
The students danced and stood without sleep for 46 hours — from 6 p.m. February 16 through 4 p.m. February 18 — at the Bryce Jordan Center.
As part of our regular “We Are!” feature, we recognize nine Penn Staters who have gone above and beyond what’s asked of them in their work at the University.
Where: The Daily Collegian, “TEDxPSU conference encourages students to ‘bring about the change’ they want to see”
Penn State students created art using generative artificial intelligence in a cover contest sponsored by the College of Information Sciences and Technology.
