College of Information and Computer Sciences (CICS) doctoral candidate Anna Fariha has recently been awarded a 2020 Microsoft Research Dissertation Grant for her proposal, “Enhancing Usability and Explainability of Data Systems.”

Fariha’s work focuses on reducing the usability gap between non-expert users and complex data systems. Her thesis aims to enable data-driven systems to become more democratized and transparent, by providing programming tools for non-technical users, better explanations of algorithmic results and inferences, and tools to assess the trustworthiness of their predictions.

The Microsoft Research Dissertation Grant is awarded annually to a group of diverse students who are typically underrepresented in the field of computing. The program provides funding for a select number of entries, chosen based on the technical and scientific quality and the potential impact of the proposed research. Recipients are given up to $25,000 for the 2020-21 academic year and are invited to the Microsoft PhD Summit to share their research.