ADUniverse: Evaluating the Feasibility of (Affordable) Accessory Dwelling Units in Seattle
Emily A. Finchum-Mason, Fellow
Ph.D. Candidate, Daniel J. Evans School of Public Policy & Governance
University of Washington
Prior to joining the program, Emily spent considerable time working in both the public and nonprofit sectors. She worked as Research Associate for the Spirit of Harmony Foundation, designing advocacy campaigns to assist in the implementation of music education programs in underserved schools. She also served as a high school science teacher, and as a Research Team Coordinator for Civic Lab Chicago. Emily holds an M.S. in Public Policy & Management from the University of Washington, an M.S. in Leadership and Policy Studies from DePaul University, and a M.A. in Teaching from National Louis University. She earned a B.S. in Biological Sciences and B.A. in Psychology from the University of Illinois, Chicago.
Yuanhao Niu, Fellow
Ph.D. Student, Department of Economics
University of Notre Dame
Yuanhao Niu is a Ph.D. student at the University of Notre Dame where he pursues a doctoral degree in Economics with a minor in Computer Science. Prior to the program, he graduated with a B.A. in Economics from the Beijing Language and Culture University in 2014. He then attended the University of Illinois and the University of Sao Paulo (Brazil) for a Master’s degree in Policy Economics. He is interested in understanding the housing market, firm dynamics, and macroeconomics in the digital era. Both alternative data and machine learning methods contribute to answering the research questions. Outside of work, he spends time on standup comedy and triathlon.
Adrian Mikelangelo Tullock, Fellow
Masters Student, Interdisciplinary Data Science
University of Washington
As an undergraduate, Adrian double majored in computer science and applied mathematics at Texas State University in San Marcos. During that time, he would meet mentor and friend Jesse Silva, M.A. who would inspire him towards leadership and service. Under his wing, Adrian would go on to co-coordinate numerous leadership and diversity conferences, assume student organizational and government leadership roles, and become a mentor for attending and prospective underrepresented minorities on campus. He would also perform research and study under Dr. Bahram Asiabanpour in robotics, Dr. Oleg Komogortsev in eye-tracking, and Master Dan Baker in martial arts.
Leading up to his data science master’s candidacy, Adrian worked over five years in software development, was inducted into Beta Gamma Sigma and Phi Kappa Phi honor societies as an MBA candidate, and co-authored a financial literacy book with Wilfred Brown, MBA. Having taken interest with DSSG prior to becoming a master’s candidate, he avidly approaches the opportunity with high aspirations and hopes it will advise a large scale civil or social project he looks to lead in the future.
Anagha Uppal, Fellow
Doctoral Student, Department of Geography
University of California, Santa Barbara
She has served as the training director for the local non-profit organization East Tennessee Peace & Justice Center, where she was involved with the management of Collectives and the broader sustainability of the nonprofit as a whole. She also led a few campus food justice campaigns and has participated in Clinton Global Initiative University. Currently, her work focuses on geospatial analyses of social phenomena, particularly of a cross-cultural variety. Anagha was born and raised in north India and considers it her home.
Rick Mohler, Project Lead
Associate Professor, Department of Architecture
University of Washington
Current projects are focused on advancing housing affordability at multiple scales. As a member of Seattle’s Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) Working Group, he is exploring both the increased production of ADU’s and their use as an affordable housing strategy. As a member of the Seattle Planning Commission, Rick is a co-author of “Neighborhoods for All – Expanding Housing Opportunities in Seattle’s Single Family Zones”. As a member of Sound Communities, a volunteer group from the academic, public, private and non-profit sectors, Rick is exploring the feasibility of establishing a regional entity to ensure that our region leverages its $60B transit investment to address housing affordability.
Nick Welch, Project Lead
Senior Planner, Seattle Office of Planning and Community Development
City of Seattle
Previously, Nick was instrumental in bringing a focus on racial and social equity into the Seattle 2035 Comprehensive Plan by developing the Growth and Equity Analysis. Nick has a master’s degree in Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning from Tufts University, where he also graduated summa cum laude in International Relations and Spanish. He is a competitive distance runner and lives in Seattle with his wife and dogs.
Joseph Hellerstein, Data Science Lead
Senior Data Science Fellow, eScience Data Scientist, Affiliate Professor of Computer Science and Engineering
University of Washington
His major projects focus on the analysis of biological systems such as: predicting the phenotypes of microbe communities and improving the scale and robustness of model building in biology by incorporating technologies used in software engineering (e.g., kinetics models with templates). He has developed and taught several courses: “Molecular Biology for Computer Scientists,” “Software Development for Data Scientists,” and “Computational Systems Biology for BioMedical Applications.” His primary collaborators are in Chemical Engineering, BioEngineering, and Civil Engineering.
Dr. Hellerstein was previously a software engineering manager with Google Inc. in Seattle, a principal architect at Microsoft in Redmond, WA, and a senior manager at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Hawthorne, New York. Dr. Hellerstein received the Ph.D. in computer science from the University of California at Los Angeles. He has published approximately 200 peer-reviewed articles and two books and has taught at Columbia University and the University of Washington. Dr. Hellerstein is a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
Developing an Algorithmic Equity Toolkit with Government, Advocates, and Community Partners
Corinne Bintz, Fellow
Undergraduate Student, Department of Computer Science
Middlebury College
Corinne has experience in machine learning and data visualization. She has worked with various nonprofit organizations dedicated to social justice, such as the YWCA and Girls Who Code. Corinne spent the past spring semester in Stockholm, Sweden studying public health in the Swedish and European context. In her free time, Corinne enjoys spending time with friends outdoors in the Pacific Northwest, including hiking, backpacking, climbing, swimming and running.
Vivian Guetler, Fellow
Doctoral Student, Department of Sociology & Anthropology
West Virginia University
Her current research analyzes how terrorist groups use technologies and the role of hacktivists in countering terrorist’s social media accounts and websites. In addition, she studies algorithm biases and how they are used in the criminal justice system. Vivian studies these phenomena using qualitative and quantitative methods, network science, natural language processing, machine learning, and exploratory visualization techniques. She has presented her research in annual conferences such as the American Society of Criminology, American Sociological Association, Media Sociology Pre-Conference, Society for Terrorism Research, T2 Conference on Technology and the Future of Terror and Network Science (NetSci).
She is excited for the DSSG opportunity and to be working alongside an interdisciplinary team to help solve society’s problems through data science.
Daniella Raz, Fellow
Master’s Student, School of Information
University of Michigan
Prior to starting graduate school, she interned at Google in Dublin, Ireland. There, she worked with large-scale datasets on several projects, including user experience analysis and ad optimization. At the DSSG program, Daniella is looking forward to combining her previous experiences in policy and data analysis with more recent interests in digital privacy and ethical issues arising from the implementation of artificial intelligence systems.
Aaron Tam, Fellow
Master’s Student, Evan’s School of Public Policy and Governance
University of Washington
Prior to graduate school, Aaron worked as an organizer for the Endangered Species Coalition working with native tribes, farmers, businesses, scientists, and activists to protect southern resident orcas, gray wolves, and the Endangered Species Act. Aaron also worked as a coordinator for Carbon Washington to advocate for Washington state’s first carbon tax initiative (Initiative 732). Aaron now serves as a board member for Carbon Washington helping develop and inform climate policies in Washington state.
During his free time, Aaron enjoys playing racket sports, hiking, powerlifting, and volunteering.
Mike Katell, Project Lead
Ph.D. Candidate, Information School
University of Washington
Peaks Krafft, Faculty Advisor
Senior Research Fellow
Oxford Internet Institute
Meg Young, Community Engagement Lead
Ph.D. Candidate, Information School
University of Washington
Bernease Herman, Data Science Lead
Data Science Fellow, Research Staff, eScience Institute
University of Washington
Understanding Congestion Pricing, Travel Behavior, and Price Sensitivity
Shirley Leung, Fellow
Doctoral Student, School of Oceanography
University of Washington
She holds a B.A. in Earth Science and Biology and a M.S. in Hydrogeology from the University of Pennsylvania. Outside of work, Shirley volunteers with the Seattle Aquarium and leads local habitat restoration events as an EarthCorps Puget Sound Steward.
Cory McCartan, Fellow
Doctoral Student, Department of Statistics
Harvard University
Cory McCartan will soon be a first-year graduate student at Harvard University, pursuing a Ph.D. in statistics. He is interested in Bayesian statistics, causal inference and applications of statistics to public policy issues, especially in the areas of economic policy, voting rights, and transportation and urban planning. Cory has previously worked in organized labor, at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center’s Department of Biostatistics, and on the Chapel Development Team at Cray, Inc. He holds a B.A. in Mathematics from Grinnell College.
CJ Robinson, Fellow
Undergraduate Student, Department of Economics and Department of Political Science
University of Washington
Kiana Roshan Zamir, Fellow
Doctoral Student, Operations Research / Transportation Engineering
University of Maryland
Mark Hallenbeck, Project Lead
Director, Washington State Transportation Center
University of Washington
He is currently working with multiple agencies in the region to examine how big data and new technology can be used to improve regional mobility, while examining how changing mobility options are affecting land use decisions. He is working on transportation data projects ranging from the analysis of the performance of dynamic tolling on I-405, to the use of electronic transit fare card and dockless bike data for better multi-modal planning.
Vaughn Iverson, Data Science Lead
Research Scientist, eScience Institute
University of Washington
Vaughn joined the eScience Institute in January of 2016 and contributes expertise in the development of high performance parallel software, web technologies, noSQL databases, and data compression and visualization techniques. Vaughn is the author and maintainer of several popular open source packages and is an active contributor to many others.
Vaughn earned his Ph.D. in Biological Oceanography from the University of Washington in 2015, and also holds an M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Washington, Seattle, and a B.S. in Computer Science and Chemistry from Washington State University, Pullman. Prior to commencing his Ph.D. work, Vaughn spent over a decade in the computer industry working for Intel Corp as a staff research scientist developing video compression, internet media streaming, and content distribution technologies, for which he was awarded twenty U.S. patents.
Natural Language Processing for Peer Support in Online Mental Health Communities
Shweta Chopra, Fellow
Master’s Student, Social Policy and Data Analytics
University of Pennsylvania
Shweta has three years of experience encompassing consulting and analytics assignments. She worked with the Indian government at both the central and state levels, with technological and data interventions forming a core pillar of her work. Her work with the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs focused on research into global implementations of Information and Communications Technology interventions for citizen safety. She then worked as a consultant with the Education Department in Himachal Pradesh, India on systemic governance interventions to improve student learning outcomes in the state.
Shweta completed her Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Delhi University, and the Young India Fellowship in Liberal Studies from Ashoka University, before earning her Master’s at Penn. Moving forward, she hopes to support governments and non-profits with leveraging data science on their path to greater social justice.
David Nathan Lang, Fellow
Doctoral Candidate, Graduate School of Education
Stanford University
David is a doctoral student in the Economics of Education program and an Institute of Education Sciences Fellow. He graduated from UCLA in 2008 with a B.A. in Economics and a B.S. in Actuarial Mathematics. Prior to his doctoral studies, David worked for five years as a research analyst at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
His research interests include causal inference, psychometrics, and “text as data” methods in education research. His dissertation focuses on platform design in educational contexts. Specifically, David’s research focuses on how learning platforms can augment instructors’ abilities to anticipate student needs. At Stanford, David also obtained a master’s degree in Management Science and Engineering. He is concurrently working on a master’s degree in Computer Science. You may reach him at dnlang86(at)stanford.edu.
Kelly McMeekin, Fellow
Student, Database Management
South Puget Sound Community College
Kelly holds a BA from Santa Clara University. Notable past achievements include: doubling profits for a medical practice ten months after assuming operational control; developing an emergency supplies vendor registration form that was later adopted by counties across California; and creating, at age twelve, her data-obsessed pièce de résistance: an eighty-page encyclopedia of all things Harry Potter.
Tim Althoff, Project Lead
Assistant Professor, Computer Science & Engineering
University of Washington
Tim holds Ph.D. and M.S. degrees from the Computer Science Department at Stanford University, where he worked with Jure Leskovec. Prior to receiving his Ph.D., Tim obtained M.S. and B.S. degrees from the University of Kaiserslautern, Germany. He has received several fellowships and awards including the SAP Stanford Graduate Fellowship, Fulbright scholarship, German Academic Exchange Service scholarship, the German National Merit Foundation scholarship, and a Best Paper Award by the International Medical Informatics Association. Tim’s research has been covered internationally by news outlets including BBC, CNN, The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times.
Dave Atkins, Project Lead
Research Professor, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
University of Washington
Valentina Staneva, Data Science Lead
Senior Data Scientist, eScience Institute
University of Washington
Valentina has a Bachelors degree in Mathematics from Concord University and between her undergraduate and graduate studies she spent 1.5 years working at Los Alamos National Laboratory on problems in imaging, optimization and compressed sensing. She has broad interests in extracting information from different types of data and building tools for its use.