Most people have waited until the last minute to complete a school assignment at some point in their lives, but a new study finds that first-generation students and those belonging to underrepresented ethnic and racial groups turn in assignments later, on average, than their non-marginalized peers.

In the largest study of its kind to date, Sunil Sabnis ‘22, analyzed students’ anonymous grades and assignment submission times for more than 2,000 courses across a large U.S. university. What he discovered may have implications for designing more equitable classes and closing achievement gaps.

“We found that there are significant differences in procrastination behavior among  sociodemographic groups,” said Sabnis, who majored in information science. “More marginalized and vulnerable populations have unique experiences that might drive those differences.”

Sabnis presented this work at the Learning at Scale 2022 conference in a paper entitled, “Large-Scale Student Data Reveal Sociodemographic Gaps in Procrastination Behavior.” He received the Best Undergraduate Paper Award for the study.

Kizilcec_Sabnis_Yu_.png

Sunil Sabnis (center) presented his paper written with co-authors René Kizilcec (left), and Renzhe Yu (right) at the 2022 Learning at Scale conference. Credit: Provided

“We believe this is a group-level phenomenon related to the systemic issues that students face, especially first-generation college students and students of color,” said co-author René Kizilcec, assistant professor in the Department of Information Science in the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science. “These groups face unique challenges navigating college – called the hidden curriculum – and they might be working jobs on the side to make ends meet. Those are just some of the factors we believe are driving the stark differences in procrastination that we see in the data.”

As a frequent procrastinator himself, Sabnis was interested in how procrastination habits might impact the performance of first-generation and minority students. For decades, marginalized students have underperformed in college compared to their white and college-savvy peers, and previous research has shown that procrastination leads to worse grades and well-being. Sabnis wanted to know if procrastination plays a role in this achievement gap.

He analyzed about 2.6 million submission records from more than 25,000 students, using data obtained from Canvas, the learning management system from the university he studied. He joined the anonymized data with student demographic information from the registrar to see if specific groups of students had later average submission times than others.

Individuals belonging to a racial minority and first-generation college students procrastinate more than other groups, he found. As expected, students who turned in assignments later tended to perform worse than students who submitted them early. The impact of the procrastination on their grades was sufficient to explain about 20% of the achievement gap observed between marginalized groups and their peers.

Unlike previous research in this area, which looked at submission times in relation to a deadline, Sabnis compared submission times for groups of students relative to each other.  This “allows us to perform a novel behavioral equity-driven analysis in our paper,” he said.

This method also provides a simple and scalable way for instructors to identify procrastinators in their classes who may benefit from additional help. It could also provide a way to measure the success of interventions for at-risk students, to see if they reduce procrastination.

The study provides evidence that the relationship between procrastination and grades varies significantly across the courses in the dataset, suggesting that some courses are better than others at minimizing the damage caused by procrastination. Finding out which of these strategies are effective may be a focus of future research. Providing this information to instructors would enable them to tinker with their courses – perhaps calculating grades differently, shifting deadlines, or allowing accommodations for late work – to reduce the penalty incurred by procrastination. 

Finally, this work highlights the value of tapping into the wealth of data held in learning management systems to look not just at student performance, but also at behavior, Kizilcec said. He hopes it will encourage more equity-driven research in the field of learning analytics.

“We're just at the beginning of opening the black box of learning management systems used by universities around the world,” Kizilcec said. “Using educational data science, we can understand the behavioral sources of educational inequalities and develop new approaches to close longstanding gaps in achievement.”

Renzhe Yu of the University of California, Irvine is a co-author on the paper.

Four faculty and four students across the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science were selected in the first round of grants from the new five-year, multimillion-dollar partnership established between the college and LinkedIn. 

The awards will fund innovative research ranging from the development of foundational advances in machine learning, to improving equity, fairness, and privacy in computing methodology and practice. Through these grants, the first-of-its-kind partnership opens new channels for communication and cooperation between scientists at Cornell Bowers CIS and LinkedIn that will yield high-impact research in these areas.

“We are excited about this long-term partnership with LinkedIn,” said Kavita Bala, dean of Cornell Bowers CIS. “This targeted funding creates deeper relationships through research and networking activities, so we will come together to talk about important research problems that span industry and academia.” 

Dozens of faculty and students applied for the funding and the successful recipients represent research expertise across all three Bowers CIS departments. The selection was chaired by Thorsten Joachims, associate dean for research at Cornell Bowers CIS. “It is exciting to see the breadth of faculty and student interest,” Joachims said, “and how this partnership can inform the real-world impact of our research.”

“When industry and academia collaborate to build our collective knowledge, everyone benefits," said Ya Xu, head of Data and AI at LinkedIn. "We're excited to embark on this journey with Cornell Bowers CIS, driving forward research in Data Science and AI, with a focus on improving equity."

Cornell Bowers CIS faculty received grants to support the following projects:

•  Emma Pierson, assistant professor of computer science at Cornell Tech: Training the engineering workforce to develop fair algorithms

In a large-scale, randomized controlled trial, Pierson will investigate how best to train engineers to design fairer algorithms. The work will result in a publicly available algorithmic fairness class for engineers, available through Coursera.

•  Karthik Sridharan, associate professor of computer science: Reinforcement Learning for Optimizing Long-Term and Short-Term Costs

Currently, machine learning-based systems are good at accomplishing short-term goals, like achieving high click-through rates, but less effective at long-term objectives, like enhancing user engagement. This project aims to develop new machine learning methods that optimize both long- and short-term goals, while preventing polarization and bias, which can occur over time with such systems.  

•  Allison Koenecke, assistant professor of information science: Early Stoppage of Randomized Controlled Trials on Heterogeneous Populations

Researchers often end clinical trials or A/B tests early when statistical analysis shows a clear benefit to a medical treatment. However, methods for deciding when to stop a trial early may disadvantage minority groups, which typically make up a small percentage of trial participants. Koenecke proposes to develop fair rules for stopping a trial and determine how to implement those rules in a straightforward way in real-world settings.

•  David Matteson, associate department chair and associate professor of statistics and data science: Deep Generative Models for Large-scale Ranking and Temporal Datasets

For this project, Matteson will use a type of machine learning approach called Generative Adversarial Networks to correct the issues of missing and biased data in large datasets. Additionally, he aims to ensure fairness and privacy through these methods.

For the student awards, selected Ph.D. candidates will receive grants to cover one year of their research. These awards can help the students gain valuable experience in applying for and managing grant funding.

The following students were selected:

·  Ruihan Wu, a computer science doctoral student advised by Kilian Weinberger, works on identifying and solving security and privacy problems in machine learning. Her research will deal with protecting data privacy when analyzing social networks and limiting negative effects from “cheaters” who create fake accounts on peer recommendation sites.

·  Marios Papachristou, a doctoral student in computer science advised by Jon Kleinberg, studies the dynamics of real-world social networks, looking at how income shocks move through financial networks as a type of contagion. This work was previously used to determine an equitable system for bailouts and could be applied to other networks involving mismatched supply and demand, such as ridesharing apps, high-performance computing, ad placement, and supply chains.

·  Anthonia Carter, a doctoral student in information science advised by Christobal Cheyre, is designing social and technological solutions for allocating money more equitably to under-resourced communities. She will be looking at how investing in emerging venture capitalists and first-time startup founders, especially those from historically marginalized communities, may be an opportunity to diversify investment portfolios and achieve increased returns.

·  Kimberly Hochstedler, a doctoral student in statistics and data science advised by Martin Wells, investigates the imperfect algorithms commonly used to classify individuals in the criminal justice system, healthcare, and in business hiring practices. She is working on a bias correction strategy to correct misclassifications and to understand bias in social systems.

A kickoff event for the strategic partnership will occur in September, where researchers at Cornell Bowers CIS and LinkedIn will gather in Ithaca. A retreat is planned for the following May, where award winners will be invited to present research findings. 

Written by Patricia Waldron, a science writer for the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science.

By Grace Collins

The 2022 cohort of the College of Engineering’s Kessler Fellows program has successfully accepted internship offers at startups around the country, doing innovative work from modern beekeeping to designer jewelry subscriptions.   

Open to any undergraduate student in their junior year at Cornell University, the Kessler Fellows program gives students with a passion for entrepreneurship the opportunity to obtain firsthand experience of the day-to-day working for a startup.   

Fully funded through the generosity of Andrew Kessler ‘80, the Kessler Fellows receive a weekly stipend that allows them to spend the summer focused on their internship full-time. The fellows also receive individualized mentorship and guidance from Cornell Engineering Entrepreneurs-in-Residence throughout the spring semester, when they take courses on entrepreneurship as they search for a startup that aligns with their passions and values.   

Among the 2022 Kessler Fellows is Kendall Hoffman '23, who is an information science major in the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science (and also majoring in environment and sustainability). She is interning at Ecolectro, a startup working to create a cleaner, cheaper and more scalable green hydrogen to decarbonize the economy.

“Through the Kessler Fellowship, I hope to learn valuable skills and gain hands-on experience through a culture and community of innovation that can't be found at a traditional company,” said Hoffman. “I hope to learn from an inspiring and mission-driven team and surround myself with people who share my passionate commitment to a common purpose."  

When the Kessler Fellows return to campus in the fall after completing their internships, they’ll present to their peers and mentors on their experiences, lessons learned, and future plans. 

“This cohort of Kessler Fellows have used all of the advantages of this program and have set themselves up for an incredible summer,” said Alex Hagen, program director. “On average, each student had three internship offers to choose from so they were able to choose the best fit personally and professionally. I'm very excited for the recap in the fall where they will share their experiences with us as well as their plans for the future.” 

Applications for the 2022-23 Kessler Fellows cohort will be open in the fall for any Cornell junior with an interest in entrepreneurship. Learn more about the Kessler Fellows program and the fellows’ summer journeys on the Cornell Engineering website.

This piece is adapted from coverage originally appearing in the Cornell Chronicle.

By Tom Fleischman for the Cornell Chronicle

It’s a common occurrence: Your phone or computer’s operating system runs an automatic update, and all of a sudden things look a little different.

Most of us understand that it happens occasionally, and it’s no big deal. But for people who’ve experienced digital stalking or harassment at the hands of a current or former intimate partner, these seemingly innocuous changes can be terrifying.

That and other types of computing-related retraumatization can be lessened or avoided in a few low- or no-cost ways, said Nicola Dell, associate professor of information science at the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech, and in the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science.

She and colleague Tom Ristenpart, associate professor of computer science at Cornell Tech and in Cornell Bowers CIS, led a research group focused on “trauma-informed computing” – an approach that acknowledges trauma’s impact and seeks to make technology safer for all users, not just those who’ve experienced trauma.

Janet X. Chen, doctoral student in the field of information science, is co-lead author of “Trauma-Informed Computing: Towards Safer Technology Experiences for All,” which the research group presented at CHI ’22: Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, held April 29-May 5 in New Orleans. The other lead authors are Allison McDonald and Yixin Zou, doctoral students from the University of Michigan.

Dell and her colleagues define trauma-informed computing as “an ongoing commit­ment to improving the design, development, deploy­ment and support of digital technologies by: explicitly acknowledging trauma and its impact; recognizing that digital technologies can both cause and exacer­bate trauma; and actively seeking out ways to avoid technology-related trauma and retraumatization.”

Several of the paper’s co-authors have experience with communities who’ve experienced trauma, including victims of intimate partner violence (IPV). 

“Over time, we noticed that there were a lot of survivors who were really just freaked out by technology,” Dell said. “They were having responses to what you or I might consider mundane technology things – a website crashing, a software update or their email changing because Google updated something – that would really cause a disproportionate response in how they were reacting to it.

“And often, they would assume that it meant that they had been hacked, or that they were being abused,” she said, “We started to realize that what they were describing, and many of the reactions we were seeing, correlated very well with well-known trauma or stress reactions – things like hypervigilance, numbness or hopelessness.”

The group’s framework consists of six principles, adapted from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration for the design, development, deployment and evaluation of computing systems. Those principles include safety, trust, collabora­tion, peer support, enablement (empowerment) and intersectionality (relating to cultural, historical and gender issues).

The paper – which illustrates trauma in computing via three fictional vignettes, based on publicly available accounts as well as the authors’ experiences – explores application of these principles in the areas of user-experience research and design; security and privacy; artificial intelligence and machine learning; and or­ganizational culture in tech companies.

“We know from our work with IPV survivors that many of these advocacy organizations, social work organizations, hospitals and schools have really worked to incorporate trauma-informed approaches,” Dell said. “For us, it was bringing this idea to the computing community to say, ‘What would it take to make your products and technologies more trauma-informed?’”

One approach, Dell said, could be to let users manage a list of potential triggers for their trauma.

“Everyone knows that Facebook is going to show you ads,” she said, “but maybe you can just say, ‘Don’t show me ads about baby products, because I just experienced pregnancy loss.’ Allowing people some control over what they see, and explaining why you don’t want to see a certain thing, could help enable and empower people.”

The authors made 22 such suggestions for ways to make computing safer for all users, such as: conducting user studies in a safe, secure location; providing clear information when software updates are pending, with options for whether and when to install; creating content policies with input from impacted communities; and providing training and resources to help tech workers better interact with trauma survivors.

One thing the researchers urge tech companies not to do: seek out people and ask them questions about their traumatic experience. That can cause needless retraumatization, they said.

Getting buy-in from the tech community “definitely could be a challenge,” Dell said, but some simple steps are achievable.

“We’ve talked quite a bit to various technology companies and have generally received a very enthusiastic response,” she said. “I think they're very interested in trying to do some of these things. Certainly we would hope that technology companies don’t want to be traumatizing or retraumatizing people.”

Other collaborators include doctoral student Emily Tseng; Florian Schaub, assistant professor of information science at Michigan; and Kevin Roundy and Acar Tamersoy of the NortonLifeLock Research Group.

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation, Google and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

This story originally appeared on the Cornell Chronicle

Information Science and Performing & Media Arts
Peterborough, United Kingdom

Why did you choose Cornell?

I had a wide variety of interests and did not know what I wanted to study. I chose Cornell as I felt assured that I would find something that interested and challenged me. 

What is your main extracurricular activity and why is it important to you?

I am a member of a film organization, Delta Kappa Alpha. I enjoyed having a space to explore my interests with like-minded people. 

What have you accomplished as a Cornell student that you are most proud of?

I completed an honors thesis in film. This had been the largest project I have taken on, but it has been satisfying and encouraging to see everything come together.

By Rachel Spivak 

Information Science
Avon, Connecticut

Why did you choose Cornell?

I will never forget the first time I came to Cornell. It was one of those beautiful spring days where almost every student was out on campus. The slope was filled with people laughing and studying, and the weather was perfect. It truly looked like a scene from a movie. I knew I loved the campus itself, but I began to wonder if any programs at Cornell would truly be a good fit for my unique interests. I had always loved math and knew that whatever I wanted to study should be STEM-focused. I wanted to try computer science but didn’t know where to begin. After further research, the information science major intrigued me. This major would give me the flexibility to take classes that sparked my interest, eventually leading me to focus on data science and user experience.  Because it was a major within the College of Arts & Sciences, I could focus on information science while also exploring other topics through my core requirements.

What are the most valuable skills you gained from your education?

Aside from the quantitative skills I gained through my coursework, I would say the most useful skills I gained were invaluable communication and collaboration skills. As I progressed through my Cornell education, my classes shifted from exam-based to project-based, which was immensely helpful in my transition into the “real world.” This past semester I have been working as an analyst at Blackstone and I constantly find myself relating my work to projects I did in the user experience concentration. The collaborative style of the information science curriculum allowed me to grow as an individual and prepared me immensely for my career.

What is your main extracurricular activity and why is it important to you?

My main extracurricular activity is Cornell Club Lacrosse. This organization has completely shifted my college experience. I have gained lifelong mentors and learned so much. The Cornell Club Lacrosse team has given me a second family. I love being able to put all my stress behind me and go to practice and compete in friendly games. This past year I was elected as co-captain, which was a large responsibility to rebuild the team after the pandemic prohibited us from playing last season. It was so rewarding to finally play on Schoellkopf Field this season knowing our hard work paid off. 

What have you accomplished as a Cornell student that you are most proud of?

I am most proud of my senior thesis as I view it as a culmination of all that I have learned at Cornell. I am working on my senior thesis with Professor Wilkens, who is my advisor. My research is focused on gender inequality within STEM, specifically during the job recruitment process at Cornell. I feel lucky to have met so many inspiring professors throughout this process, and I hope that my research will provide the Cornell Bowers CIS Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion data to create specialized events/workshops.

I am also extremely proud of my work as a teaching assistant. I vividly remember struggling with my first coding assignment as a freshman and going to a TA for help. I was so relieved after I realized TAs act as a support network, and I knew I wanted to be able to provide help to my peers when I had the opportunity.

By Louis DiPietro

There is no scientific evidence of gender bias in letters of recommendation written for women applicants in the historically male-dominated field of experimental particle physics, according to new research co-led by Cornell.

In a massive computational analysis of more than 2,200 anonymized letters of recommendation written for applicants seeking tenure-track faculty positions in experimental particle physics, psychology and sociology, researchers from Cornell and the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory found no significant differences in words used in letters written for female candidates versus those for male candidates.

“The general result was that women are not described as less extraordinary or brilliant than their male counterparts,” said Sterling Chance Williams-Ceci, a doctoral student in the field of information science and co-author of “Assessing Gender Bias in Particle Physics and Social Science Recommendations for Academic Jobs,” which was published in the journal Social Sciences in February. “In fact, we found that letters for each gender of candidate did not have many differences in language, and the few differences that we found usually favored women over men.”

The team compared gender differences in letters of recommendation across academic fields where women have vastly different representation. Along with roughly 1,000 letters from experimental particle physics, where women represent just 15% of field faculty, the team analyzed another 1,000 letters for tenure-track positions in psychology and sociology, two fields where women Ph.Ds outnumber their male counterparts. The inclusion of letters from psychology and sociology (the bulk coming from social psychology) helped provide the team with a control group or “ground truth,” said Williams-Ceci. 

Crafting lists of words associated with gender bias drawn from previous studies, the team parsed through every letter of recommendation and categorized word choices from the letters’ authors, noting positive and negative words (for instance, “upbeat” versus “dour”), standout and grindstone words (“brilliant” versus “strong work ethic”), and agentic and communal words (“a force” versus “team player”).

In terms of word choice used in letters for applicants in the field of experimental particle physics, there were very few differences in the types of words used for men and women applicants. Among those differences: In the social sciences, words like “commit” and “success” were more frequently used in letters for women applicants, while “science” and “technical” were more common for men; in physics, words like “notable” and “brilliant” appeared more frequently when describing women, while “talent” and “dedication” favored men. 

“Given the striking underrepresentation of women in [experimental particle physics], we were surprised not to find weaker letters for women,” the authors wrote. 

Nationwide, women remain underrepresented in STEM fields, accounting for just over a quarter of STEM workers, according to U.S. Census data. Researchers have investigated possible causes including hiring and promotion biases, differences in career preferences, and possible gender bias in letters of recommendation.

Cornell co-authors from the College of Human Ecology, Stephen Ceci, the Helen L. Carr Professor of Developmental Psychology, and Wendy Williams, a professor in the department of psychology and director of the Cornell Institute for Women in Science, have done extensive research into bias in letters of recommendation and have found little statistical evidence that women receive more unflattering letters of recommendation for STEM jobs than men.

Still, the research team felt a larger, more robust and definitive study was necessary to rule out gender bias in letters of recommendation as a possible culprit in the underrepresentation of women in STEM fields, Williams-Ceci said.

“We have improved on past studies in many ways: We used a much larger data set of letters than most studies and we used a variety of different techniques, and we still arrived at the same conclusions,” she said. “Given that, we think it’s important for practitioners in the field, and people trying to mitigate the problem of underrepresentation, to focus on studying other potential causes.”

Along with Williams-Ceci and her parents Williams and Ceci, paper authors are: Robert H. Bernstein (lead author) of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory; Michael Macy, the Goldwin Smith Professor of Arts and Sciences in the College of Arts and Sciences, and Christopher Cameron, computational scientist at Cornell’s Center for Advanced Computing.

This research was partly funded by the National Science Foundation.

Louis DiPietro is a writer for the Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science.

By Tom Fleischman for the Cornell Chronicle

Construction is scheduled to begin in early 2023 on a state-of-the-art academic building for the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science. The new building will accommodate the college’s rapid growth, promote student and faculty collaborations and create an open landscaped green space with Bill and Melinda Gates Hall.

The building will provide space and maintain community for Bowers CIS, where 76% of all Cornell undergraduates take at least one class, and which has experienced a sixfold increase in enrollment over the past decade and recently passed the milestone of 2,000 student majors. Expected to open in 2025, it will also bring the college’s three departments – computer science, information science, and statistics and data science – into a single complex for the first time.

“There’s a huge intellectual benefit from having the departments together as a coherent and collaborative whole,” said Kavita Bala, dean of Cornell Bowers CIS. “The inspiration that results from working close together and serendipitously meeting each other is going to have a huge positive impact on seeding new kinds of ideas that cross disciplines and department boundaries.”

To make room for the new building, Cornell will relocate its NCAA Division I baseball field to the corner of Ellis Hollow and Game Farm roads, south of the McGovern soccer fields in the Town of Ithaca.

The new synthetic-turf baseball field will feature stadium seating for 500, as well as an enclosed clubhouse and press box. The stadium complex, designed by Stantec Ewing Cole Architects, will be built into the existing hillside; spectators will enter at concourse level and either walk down to their seats or stand for an unobstructed view of the field.

An 80-car parking lot will be built adjacent to the field, connected to Ellis Hollow Road by a new private access road.

“Hoy Field has been a wonderful home to the Cornell Baseball program for 100 years,” said Ryan Lombardi, vice president for student and campus life. “In collaboration with the coaching and athletics staff, we’re confident the new field and facility will introduce an exciting new chapter for Cornell Baseball.”

The project is largely made possible by the 2020 gift from Ann S. Bowers ’59 that named the college.

The new L-shaped building will be located south of Gates Hall and attached by a bridge at its eastern façade. Together, the four-story buildings will form an open landscaped green space that will provide a place for gathering and events, while also strengthening the identity of Bowers CIS.  Rhodes Hall, which houses elements of Bowers CIS, as well as Upson and Duffield halls, will be visible from the building and its landscaped areas.

“The outdoor space will be wonderful,” Bala said. “Our students will have a place to hang out and be part of our community.”

The new college building is fully accessible along its length, with multiple entrances; the main entrance will face Hoy Road, reached by a sloping accessible path up from a new crosswalk, or along a pathway from Gates Hall. The Gimme! Coffee currently in Gates Hall will move to the new building’s Hoy Road entrance foyer.

Bala envisions the two buildings becoming one space for Bowers CIS. “Our plan is to really have it be a unified complex,” she said, “with the departments flowing across these two spaces, and fostering continuity across the college.”

The ground floor of the new building will contain the most active elements of the building, including the cafe; a large common area for gathering; large classrooms; and spaces for maker and builder labs. The upper floors will house research and administrative offices, research labs, associated collaboration spaces and meeting spaces.

The structure will feature high-performance building materials that meet or exceed Cornell’s sustainability goals – including carbon reduction, energy use reduction, water conservation and integrated landscape.

Construction on the new home for Cornell baseball will begin later this year, and is expected to be completed in time for the 2023 season. Hoy Field celebrated its 100th anniversary this year; it hosted opposing players including Hall of Famer Lou Gehrig (Columbia), former president George H.W. Bush (Yale) and former New York Mets pitcher and current broadcaster Ron Darling (Yale).

Cornell has hired Boston-based architects Leers Weinzapfel, along with landscape architects Olin Studio, to design the new building for Bowers CIS.