Podcast: Exposing Engineering to Underrepresented Groups with Dr. Amon Millner

In this week’s episode, Tom joins Dr. Amon Millner at the Olin College of Engineering campus to discuss the importance of accessibility relating to computing.

Dr. Millner is an Assistant Professor of Computing and Innovation at the Olin College of Engineering in Needham, MA (which was recently recognized as the most well-regarded school of engineering in the world.) He also has earned his Ph.D. at the famous MIT Media Lab, studied and taught Computer Science at USC, and earned a Master in Human-Computer Interaction at Georgia Tech.

With the rise of artificial intelligence, Millner thinks it’s critical to engage diverse voices to ensure equitable treatment. He also believes to get more underrepresented groups into engineering schools, it is better to start early, like Kindergarten, with coding and problem-solving.

Amon Millner’s insights are timely and important in the fields of Computer Science and machine learning. In this episode, he addresses the issues of access and empowerment and talks about why teaching at Olin is so important in his mission to expose to engineering groups that have been historically underrepresented.

Key Takeaways:

[:15] About today’s episode.
[1:09] Tom welcomes Dr. Millner to the podcast.
[1:11] About Millner’s education.
[5:18] Why Human-Computer Interaction, empowerment, and teaching at the Olin College of Engineering is so important to Millner.
[8:53] Millner talks about the future of machine learning and asks some important questions.
[15:15] Millner describes the approach to education in Olin and some of the key elements.
[17:28] How Millner would describe the approach to Computer Science at Olin.
[19:55] How they prepare students at Olin to go past the introductory experience.
[21:33] The importance of accessibility and how Millner thinks we can do better in American high schools and colleges to expose groups that have
been historically underrepresented to engineering.
[26:00] What is an experience at school that Millner would like to see all kids have?
[29:03] Millner expresses his optimism and excitement by the work happening at Olin.

Mentioned in This Episode:

Dr. Amon Millner
Olin College of Engineering
University of Southern California (USC)
MIT Media Lab
Georgia Tech
Lifelong Kindergarten
The University of Texas at El Paso

For more, see:

• How AI Curriculum Can Prepare Students for Success in a New World 
• You’ve Heard Computers Have Low EQ, Not Anymore
• Podcast: Iveta Brigis on Talent Development 

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