Liz Gerber Named 2014 Recipient of IEEE Undergraduate Teaching Award
The Computer Science and Engineering Undergraduate Teaching Award is for her work with Design for America
Northwestern University Cordell Breed Junior Professor of Design Liz Gerber has been named the 2014 recipient of the IEEE Computer Society Computer Science and Engineering Undergraduate Teaching Award for her contributions to learning.
Liz Gerber earned her MS and PhD in product design and management science and engineering at Stanford University. She specializes in design and human-computer interaction, particularly how social computing supports the innovation process. Her current research investigates crowdfunding as a mechanism for reducing disparities in entrepreneurship. Gerber was recognized "for her paradigm-shifting extracurricular design initiative that fosters interdisciplinary collaboration and learning."
Gerber's work funded by the US National Science Foundation and the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance has appeared in peer-reviewed journals, including ACM Transactions on Computer Human Interactions, Design Studies, and Organization Science.
As an award-winning teacher and researcher, Gerber has touched the lives of more than 6,000 students through her teaching at Northwestern's Segal Design Institute and Stanford University's Hasso Plattner's Institute of Design and through her paradigm-shifting creation, Design for America, a national network of students using design to tackle social challenges.
In the past five years, Gerber's students have won more than 25 local and national awards for their technical innovations, such as the Dell Social Innovation Award and Federal Health Design Challenge. They have also launched companies to address complex societal problems such as hospital-acquired infections and Type 2 Diabetes. Her students been featured in outlets such as MIT's Technology Review, The Chicago Tribune, Wall Street Journal, ABC News, and more.
The Computer Science and Engineering Undergraduate Teaching Award comes with a certificate and $2,000 honorarium. The award honors outstanding contributions to undergraduate education through teaching and service, and for help in maintaining interest in the field.