About

Previous to starting his Ph.D. studies in the HCI Institute at Carnegie Mellon, Matt worked in Peace Corps Mongolia, where he initiated a national network of after-school clubs to teach 'Life Skills.' His book of lesson plans on critical thinking and debate was adopted by the Mongolian Ministry of Education as a result. At the local level, he taught Computers and English at a Mongolian secondary school and helped start the school's small dairy business. While at CMU, Matt applied his HCI skills to the redesign of CMU's Technology Consulting in the Community class that led computer science undergraduate students through a semester-long technology consultation with Pittsburgh-area non-profits. Matt also developed the Causality Lab software used to teach causal and statistical learning to future social scientists at CMU and other quality learning zones across the country. Matt's Ph.D. research is aimed at his life-long goal of developing technology that will help teach students the skills of the informed, democratic citizen. He is currently developing an educational game with intelligent cognitive tutoring software that will provide students with individualized instruction on how to become active engaged citizens. This game will incorporate a software tool (iLogos) that he built for diagramming causal claims in policy-related research documents. Matt has given seven research presentations at major conferences, published a journal article, two papers in the proceedings of competitive international conferences, and two book chapters.

Education

Carnegie Mellon University

Ph.D. , Computer Science

Class of 2010

Awards & Publications