Syed Ishtiaque AhmedProfile page
Associate Professor
Faculty of Arts and Science, Department of Computer Science
- Associate ProfessorFaculty of Arts and Science, Department of Computer Science
- 647-220-3482
- Bahen Centre for Information Technology, Department of Computer Science, 40 St. George Street, Room 5262, Toronto, ON, M5S 2E4, Canada
BIO
Ishtiaque Ahmed is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at the University of Toronto. He directs the Third Space research group at the DGP Lab. He is also a graduate faculty member of the School of Environment, a Faculty Fellow at the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society, and a Senior Fellow at the Massey College. He co-organizes the monthly UofT Critical Computing Seminar that hosts speakers analyzing computer science and its applications from the perspectives of marginalization, bias, and oppression. He also co-directs the PRISM program at the CS Department that trains students from marginalized communities for higher education in computer science. He also leads the weekly Critical Data Science reading group that studies and analyzes recent scholarly work around AI and Machine Learning from various critical points of view. His research interest is situated at the intersection of computer science and the critical social sciences. His work is often motivated by social justice and sustainability issues, and he puts them in the academic contexts of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and Information and Communication Technology and Development (ICTD). He operates through a wide range of technical and methodological apparatuses from ethnography to design, and from NLP to tangible user interface.
Ahmed earned his PhD at Cornell University, where he was advised by Steve Jackson. Before moving to North America, he studied and taught Computer Science at Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET). He developed and still mentors the first HCI community in Bangladesh. He is a Schwartz Reisman Institute Faculty Fellow ('21), Senior Massey Fellow ('21), Fulbright Centennial Fellow ('19), a Connaught Scholar ('18), a Fulbright S&T Fellow ('11), and an OpenStreetMap Scholar ('10). His current research is supported by all three divisions of Canada's federal tri-council research agency: NSERC, CIHR, and SSHRC, among others.
Preferred method of contact: Email
MEDIA
ACADEMIC POSITIONS
- Associate ProfessorUniversity of Toronto, Computer Science, Toronto, Canada2024 - present
- Assistant ProfessorUniversity of Toronto, Computer Science, Toronto, Canada2017 - 2024
- LecturerUnited International University, Computer Science, Dhaka, Bangladesh2009 - 2009
- Programming InstructorUnited International University, Computer Science, Dhaka, Bangladesh2009 - 2010
- Visiting LecturerMilitary Institute of Science and Technology, Computer Science, Dhaka, Bangladesh2010 - 2010
- Visiting LecturerUniversity of Asia Pacific, Computer Science, Dhaka, Bangladesh2010 - 2011
- LecturerBangladesh University of Engineering & Technology, Computer Science, Dhaka, Bangladesh2009 - 2011
NON-ACADEMIC POSITIONS
- LeadHuman Technology Interaction2010 - present
- Summer Research InternMicrosoft2015 - 2015
- Community MemberOpenStreetMap Foundation2010 - 2012
DEGREES
- B.Sc.Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Bangladesh
- M.Sc.Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Bangladesh
- M.Sc.Cornell University, Ithaca, United States
- Ph.D.Cornell University, Ithaca, United States
CERTIFICATIONS
- FellowshipSchwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society
- Senior FellowshipMassey College, University of Toronto
- Blue Sky Research Award, Runner UpAAAI HCOMP
- Research Proposal WinnerFacebook
- Best Paper Honorable Mention AwardACM CHI
- exploreCSR AwardGoogle
- Centennial FellowshipFulbright
- AI & Society FellowshipMicrosoft2024 - present
- Inclusion Research AwardGoogle2023 - present
LANGUAGES
- Arabic
- Hindi
- Bengali
AVAILABILITY
- Masters Research or PhD student supervision
- Collaborative projects
- Media enquiries
- Membership of an advisory committee
- Join a web conference as a panellist or speaker
- Industry Projects
INSTITUTIONAL STRATEGIC INITIATIVES
- Institute for Pandemics (IfP)
- Data Sciences Institute (DSI)
- Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society (SRI)
- School of Cities