Newsmakers | Golisano College of Computing and Information Sciences

Highlighting the professional and academic accomplishments of College of Computing and Information Sciences students, faculty, and staff.

Newsmakers are a quick and easy way to acknowledge the professional and academic accomplishments of RIT students, faculty, and staff, such as publishing an article in a scholarly journal, presenting research at a conference, serving on a panel discussion, earning a scholarship, or winning an award. Newsmakers appear in News and Events as well as the "In the News" section on faculty/staff directory profile pages.

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January 2025

January 17, 2025

Daqing Hou, chair of the software engineering department, received NSF funding for "Integrating Cybersecurity in Computing Curricula," focusing on Identity and Access Management through a software project-based learning approach. The project is part of the NSF's Security, Privacy, and Trust in Cyberspace program which supports interdisciplinary research and education to develop a secure, resilient, and trustworthy global cyber ecosystem.

December 2024

December 12, 2024

Jennifer Hinton, director of games industry relations at MAGIC Spell Studios, was a featured speaker at the inaugural BIPOC Virtual Job Fair on Dec. 7. The event was sponsored by the IGDA Foundation, The Black in Gaming Foundation, and Women in Games International.
December 11, 2024

Students in the Golisano College of Computing and Information Sciences won three major awards at the Wolfjam Hackathon for Student Games at the University at Albany. Nick Will, a new media interactive development student, won the Oakley Award recognizing a Wolfjam participant who embodies the spirit of community and fosters a positive atmosphere. Andrew Jameison, Carl Browning, and Ryce Hazard, all game design and development students, won second place for their game, Connect’in. Josephine Caradonna, Dylan Clauson, Ariel Cthwe, Pilot DesLauriers, Kai Gidwani, Katie Hellmann, McKenzie Lam, Leah Torregiano, all game design and development students, and Gator Flack, a cybersecurity student, won the Nexus Award, recognizing the best project related to the theme of influencers and creators, for their game Sc are Parts. In addition to the awards, five honorable mentions were made by RIT students.
December 4, 2024

Eva Navarro, professor in the School of Interactive Games and Media and a member of the Science and Methodology Committee overseeing research at the International Panel on the Information Environment, contributed to “Trends in the Global Information Environment: 2024 Expert Survey Results.” The survey observed how experts around the world perceive the features of and threats to the information environment.

November 2024

November 21, 2024

Stephen Jacobs, professor in RIT’s School of Interactive Games and Media and scholar-in-residence with The Strong National Museum of Play, was featured in the American Journal of Play, Vol. 16, No. 2 and 3. The peer-reviewed interdisciplinary academic journal published “The History of the Toy and Games Industries Seen through a Jewish Lens: An Interview with Stephen Jacobs.”
November 12, 2024

A team of eight RIT CyberScholars from the NSF CyberCorps Scholarship for Service program placed first and 11th at the University of Arkansas's RazorHack cybersecurity competition on the weekend of Oct. 27. The first-place team included students Rick Wallert, Donovan Hwang, Albert Hynes, and Andrew Bush, while the 11th-place team featured students Jaime Campanelli, Sabran Evangelista, Ashley Alt, and Kelsey Tirado.The competition tested their skills in penetration testing, cryptography, steganography, buffer overflow attacks, web attacks, and physical security. The CyberScholars also presented on topics such as covert communications and AI ethics, earning high praise for engagement from the University of Arkansas’s CyberHogs club. RIT’s SFS program, led by Bo Yuan, Andy Meneely, and Rajendra K. Raj, prepares students for careers in national cybersecurity through scholarships and accelerated degree programs.
November 11, 2024

Igor Polotai, a game design and development and history double major, presented "The RIT Iceberg: A Study of Collegiate Student Folklore and Traditions" at the American Folklore Society's Annual Meeting on Nov. 7 in Albuquerque, N.M.
November 8, 2024

Stephen Jacobs, professor in RIT’s School of Interactive Games and Media, is presenting “The History of Jews in the Toy and Game Industry” at the JCC Lane Dworkin Authors + Innovators Festival, at 10 a.m. Nov. 17, at the JCC of Greater Rochester. Jacobs will discuss Jewish game changers who shaped the Western industrialized toy, game, pinball, and video game businesses.
November 6, 2024

U-RISE participant and cybersecurity student Hayden Orr presented “MULTICOLLAB-ASL: Towards Affective Computing for the Deaf Community” at ASSETS 2024. Co-authors included Michael Peechatt, a computing and information sciences Ph.D. student, and Cecilia Alm, professor in the Department of Psychology.
November 6, 2024

A team of cybersecurity students placed third in the Hivestorm collegiate cyber defense competition on Oct. 16. The team included Asa Horn, Justin Huang, Tyler Allen, and Massimo Marino. Teams compete by securing provided virtual machines, accumulating points for removing malware and other infections, correcting misconfigurations, mitigating vulnerabilities, and disabling vulnerable services.