Syed Ishtiaque Ahmed is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of Toronto, with a courtesy appointment at the Faculty of Information and the School of Environment. He leads the “Third Space” research group focusing on studying and building technologies with marginalized communities. He is also a Faculty Fellow at the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society, and a Senior Fellow at Massey College. He is a steering committee member of UofT’s Sustainable Development Goals institutional strategic initiative, and a member of the Presidential International Council in the Indian subcontinent. Ahmed was born and raised in Bangladesh, and obtained his Master’s and Ph.D. degrees at Cornell University in the USA. He has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles in top Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) venues and won multiple accolades. His research has been funded by all three divisions of Canada’s federal tri-council research agency: NSERC, CIHR, and SSHRC, and several industry partners, including Google, Meta (Facebook), and Microsoft. Ahmed is a Fulbright Science and Technology Fellow, a Connaught Scholar, and an OpenStreetMap Scholar. In 2019, he was recognized as one of the four “Centennial Fulbright Fellows” worldwide for his contribution to social and environmental justice.
