{"id":111862,"date":"2017-12-15T09:57:35","date_gmt":"2017-12-15T14:57:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/?p=111862"},"modified":"2019-10-18T15:55:27","modified_gmt":"2019-10-18T19:55:27","slug":"qa-matt-jadud-drives-toward-a-fundamentally-inclusive-digital-and-computational-studies-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/2017\/12\/15\/qa-matt-jadud-drives-toward-a-fundamentally-inclusive-digital-and-computational-studies-program\/","title":{"rendered":"Q&A: Matt Jadud envisions a ‘fundamentally inclusive’ Digital and Computational Studies program"},"content":{"rendered":"

Appointed to the Bates faculty this year, Matt Jadud has a rare task in higher education: building a brand-new academic program, in this case the college\u2019s nascent <\/span>Digital and Computational Studies <\/span>program.<\/span><\/p>\n

The inaugural Colony Family Professor of Digital and Computational Studies\u00a0<\/span>\u2014 a new faculty position funded though the Bates Campaign<\/a> \u2014 Jadud will oversee the hiring of two more professors in DCS while developing the overall look and feel of the curriculum, following a<\/span> roadmap developed by Bates faculty<\/span><\/a> over the last couple of years.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jadud knows what kind of people<\/a> he wants for the DCS program \u2014 and what type of program Bates should have.<\/p>\n

“I want people who are thinking hard about the human condition behind the technological condition,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd the Bates program will have a commitment to structures that are fundamentally inclusive and that value diversity.\u201d<\/p>\n

In training and temperament, Jadud is well-equipped for the job.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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The Bates DCS program will have a “commitment to integration with the liberal arts. Most computer science departments are silos, charged with graduating computer science majors,\u201d says Matthew Jadud, the inaugural Colony Family Professor of Digital and Computational Studies, speaking during a Back to Bates faculty discussion. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p><\/div>\n

A physics major at Kenyon College, Jadud studied education and computer science in graduate school. For his doctoral thesis at the University of Kent, in England, he explored how beginners go about writing computer programs and developed ways to determine if and how a student is struggling with learning to program. <\/span><\/p>\n

Jadud comes to Bates after five years at <\/span>Berea College<\/span>, a Kentucky liberal-arts college with a profound commitment to justice, equity, and accessibility. He wants Bates students, like his Berea students, to be heavily involved in his \u201c<\/span>fundamentally human-centered<\/span><\/a>\u201d teaching and research, which focuses on how students learn computing as well as on designing and developing low-cost, open hardware for sensing and automation.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Bates Campaign gift creates Colony Family Professorship<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jadud is the inaugural Colony Family Professor of Digital and Computational Studies, a chair endowed through a $3 million gift commitment to the Bates Campaign<\/a> from George and Ann Colony P\u201912, P\u201917.<\/p>\n

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Here, Jadud talks about how his own interest in computing developed, lays out his vision for the program in Digital and Computational Studies, and explains how technology can perpetuate inequality \u2014 or be a great tool for inclusiveness.<\/span><\/p>\n

What will distinguish Bates\u2019 DCS program?<\/h5>\n

First and foremost, the program will have that commitment to structures that are fundamentally inclusive and that value diversity. I take that very seriously.<\/p>\n

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“There should be nothing about how we design and build the program that discriminates implicitly or explicitly against any of our students,” says Matt Jadud, shown speaking with Bates parent Victoria Mills P\u201921 and Bates grandparent Inga-Britta Mills GP\u201921 during Back to Bates in September. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p><\/div>\n

In a reasonable number of years, I want more than 50 percent of the students graduating from DCS to be women, because more than 50 percent of the students at Bates are women. There should be nothing structural \u2014 nothing about how we design and build the program \u2014 that discriminates implicitly or explicitly against any of our students.<\/p>\n

Second is its commitment to integration with the liberal arts. Most computer science departments are silos, charged with graduating computer science majors. We\u2019ll move beyond a model where every student takes one course in programming, but instead ask, what does it mean as a student of literature to have a background in computing and apply that to your field of study in a way that is true to what you\u2019re pursuing?<\/p>\n

What do you hope a student who majors in DCS takes away from the experience, both in terms of technical knowledge and how they think about computing in relation to the world around them?<\/h5>\n

There are three big themes. First is learning to program. Second is learning to think about problems, decompose them, integrate the needs of both technical and human concerns into the solution to that problem \u2014 that\u2019s design thinking.<\/p>\n

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Matt Jadud: “Regardless of gender or race, you should be able to thrive and succeed in DCS at Bates without fear of discrimination or bias.” <\/em><\/p>\n