Amna Liaqat
Postdoctoral Research Fellow | Computer Science | Princeton University
I am a postdoctoral research fellow at Princeton University funded by national and university fellowships from NSERC, Princeton University, and the Center for Information Policy. I am supervised by Dr. Andrés Monroy-Hernández in the Department of Computer Science. My research in human-computer interaction focuses on building systems that foster social connection for children through learning, playing, communicating, and creating.
As a member of the Princeton HCI lab , I work on Capybara. Capybara is a mobile app that empowers children and teenagers to create in Augmented Reality. I completed my PhD at the University of Toronto in the Department of Computer Science. My research lab was TAGlab , where I was supervised by Dr. Cosmin Munteanu . For my PhD thesis, I developed a web-based storybook creation platform, StoryTapestry, to support immigrant grandparents and grandchildren in sharing culture and language with each other.More generally, I am interested in how we can cross traditional disciplinary domains to create tools grounded in real-world contexts. Across academia and industry, I have worked in the fields of computer science, education, business, and health. I am always seeking new opportunities, new domains, new methods, and new ways of thinking to create novel solutions for supporting the complex process of social connection.
Research Philosophy
My research methodology is guided by four major ideas, which are reflected in my work.
Human Centered
People always at the center. Use ethnographies, Participatory Design, and Contextual Inquiries to guide technology development.
Ground in Theory
Support design decisions. Ground motivation in theory like educational frameworks and psychosocial models.
Iterate Over Solutions
Identify technology shortcomings. Sustainable solutions require multiple rounds of refinement.
Integrate Domains
Don't duplicate prior work. Respectfully integrate research traditions from other domains.
Resume
Employment
Postdoctoral Research Fellow
2022 - Present
Princeton University
Supervisor: Dr. Andrés Monroy-Hernández
Education
PhD Computer Science
2018 - 2022
University of Toronto
Thesis Title: Digitally Mediated Support for Informal Culture and Language Learning
Supervisor: Dr. Cosmin Munteanu
Supervisory Committee Members: Dr. Joseph Jay Williams , Dr. Negin Dahya , Dr. Priyank Chandra
Master of Computer Science
2016 - 2018
University of Toronto
Thesis Title: Design Requirements for a Tool to Support the Writing Development of Mature ELLs
Supervisor: Dr. Cosmin Munteanu
Supervisory Committee Members: Dr. Mathew Zaleski
Bachelor of Business Administration with a Joint Major in Computer Science
2013 - 2016
Simon Fraser University
Graduation with Distinction
Grants
Literary Metaphors as Design Inspiration for Hybrid Spaces: A Jane Austen Pilot Project
2022 - 2023
Co-PI with Dr. Benett Axtell
Granting Agency: Sloan Foundation
Amount: $41,500
Resilience at the crossroads: a techno-feminist approach to intergenerational culture preservation through social storytelling and sense-making within displaced populations
2020 - 2022
Granting Agency: New Frontiers in Research Fund
Amount: $197,000
Toronto COVID-19 Action Fund for #HowsMyFlattening
2020 - 2021
Granting Agency: University of Toronto
Amount: $50,000
Academic Service
Organizing Committee Student Volunteer Co-Chair
2022-Present
- Creativity and Cognition (C&C) 2024
- Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW) 2023
Associate Chair
2022-2023
- Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) Late Breaking Work 2022, 2023
Reviewer
2020-Present
- Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW)
- Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI)
- Computers and Education
Student Volunteer
2015-2022
- Creativity and Cognition (C&C) 2022
- Artificial Intelligence in Education (AIED) 2021
- Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW) 2019
- International Symposium on Electronic Art (ISEA) 2015
Scholarships and Awards
Princeton Presidential Postdoctoral Fellowship
2023-2025
Princeton Center for Information Technology Policy Postdoctoral Fellowship
2022-2023
NSERC Postdoctoral Fellowship
2022-2023
Beatrice Worsley Graduate Scholarship in Computer Science
2022
University of Toronto Doctoral Completion Award
2022
General Motors Women in Science and Mathematics Award
2021
University of Toronto Arts and Science Program Completion Award
2021
Wolfond Scholarship Program in Wireless Information Technology
2021
Nick Cercone Scholarship for AI Research
2020
Ontario Graduate Scholarship
2020
Techno Impact Award
2020
AGE-WELL Drinks and Demo Award
2018
Ontario Graduate Scholarship
2018
AGE-WELL Summer Institute Hackathon Winner
2018
Ontario Graduate Scholarship
2017
Simba Technologies Inc. Scholarship in Computing Science
2016
Canadian Federation of University Women Education Award
2015
Simba Technologies Inc. Scholarship in Computing Science
2015
Scotiabank Scholarship for the Beedie School of Business
2015
SFU Undergraduate Open Scholarship
2015
SFU Entrance Scholarship
2015
Teaching
Instructor
2022
University of Toronto
- CCT480: User Experience Design - Quantitative Methods
Teaching Assistant
2016 - 2022
University of Toronto
- MGT270: Data Analytics for Management
- CCT485: User Experience Design
- CSC300: Computers and Society
- CSC108: Introduction to programming
- CCT383: The Interactive Society
Volunteer and Community Leadership
Covid Analytics Hub Team Lead
2020
#HowsMyFlattening
- #HowsMyFlattening is a centralized data analytics and visualization hub monitoring Ontario's response to COVID-19.
- Launched by myself and a small team in the first weeek of the pandemic in Ontario.
- Lead in the design, development, and implementation of the front-end website.
- Collaborated with visualization team to produce analytics.
- Aggregated data from multiple sources to identify insights and trends not available anywhere else.
- Website averaged over 2000 views a day.
- Wrote articles in the early days of the pandemic calling for responsive government action. Read here.
- Grew organization into a large Open Source community
- Recognized and promoted by Ontario’s Lieutenant Governor, the Honourable Elizabeth Dowdeswell.
Steering Committee Member
2020 - Present
SCWIST (The Society for Canadian Women in Science and Technology)
- SCWIST is Canada's oldest non-profit organization promoting girls and women in STEM.
- Steering committee member for a recently awarded million dollar federal grant.
- Provide reccomendations, insights, and engage in discussions with various stakeholders to identify opportunities for increasing SCWIST impact and growing presence in Eastern Canada.
Mentor to Unrepresented Computer Science Students
2021
PRISM (Preparation for Research through Immersion, Skills, and Mentorship)
- Mentored undergraduate students through the Google-funded PRISM program.
- Provided advice on graduate school pathways, offered resources, and suggested connections to students historically underpresented in Computer Science.
Invited Guest Mentor
2021
University of Toronto TRP (Translational Research Program)
- Entrepreneur client and mentor for students’ case studies in semester long course.
- Guided team in performing market research and developing commercialization plans.
Professional Experience
Statistical Consultant
2020 - 2022
KeyOps
- KeyOps is a knowledge exchange platform for physicians and pharmaceutical companies, founded by Dr. Sam Elfassy, Dr. Saeed Darvish-Kazem, and Dr. Ben Fine.
- Conduct statistical analysis on physician data and survey responses for pharmaceutical companies.
- Derive appropriate tests and design analysis roadmap from clients' open-ended, exploratory questions.
- Develop data pipelines to automate data pre-processing and analysis.
- Use Jupyter Notebook, Python, Numpy, and Scikit-learn to run Twitter social network analysis, driver analysis, regressions, statistical tests, and more.
- Prepare business reports to communicate insights to non-technical audiences on audience segmentation, client needs, and strategy reccomendations.
Co-Founder
2019 - 2021
Lighthouse
- Collaborated in interdisciplinary team of six to create Lighthouse, a tool for fostering social connection.
- Iterated over prototypes, engaged with stakeholders, and conducted market research to move forward with commercialization
- Won AGE-WELL's 2018 summer hackathon.
- Won AGE-WELL's 2018 Drinks and Demo Award.
Publications
Conference and Journal Papers
2025
Understanding Young People’s Creative Goals with Augmented Reality
Liaqat, A., Liu, F., Berengard, B., Cao, J., & Monroy-Hernández, A. ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW '25).
2024
Mapping the Landscape of Independent Food Delivery Platforms in the United States
Liu, Y., Liaqat, A., Zhang, X., Espinosa, M., Manjunatha, A., Yang, A., Nanda, V., Papakyriakopoulos, O., & Monroy-Hernández, A. ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW '24).
2023
Exploring Collaborative Culture Sharing Dynamics in South-Asian Immigrant Families through Digital Crafting and Storytelling
Liaqat, A., Demmans Epp, C., Cai, M., & Munteanu, C. ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW '23).
2023
Embedding and Scaling Writing Instruction Across First- and Second-Year Computer Science Courses
Zhang, L., Simion, B., Kaler, M., Liaqat, A., Dick, D., Bergen, A., Miljanovic, M., & Petersen, A. The Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE ’23)
2023
ARctic Escape: Promoting Social Connection, Teamwork, and Collaboration Using a Co-Located Augmented Reality Escape Room
Knoll, T., Liaqat, A., & Monroy-Hernández, A. Late Breaking Work at the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems(CHI’23)
2022
“With a hint she will remember”: Collaborative Storytelling and Culture Sharing between Immigrant Grandparents and Grandchildren Via Magic Thing Designs
Liaqat, A., Axtell, B., & Munteanu, C. ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW ’22)
2021
Participatory Design for Intergenerational Culture Exchange in Immigrant Families: How Collaborative Narration and Creation Fosters Democratic Engagement
Liaqat, A., Axtell, B., & Munteanu, C. ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW '21).
2020
Involving Mature English Language Learners’: Design Guidance for Combining Peer and Automated Feedback to Support Writing Development
Liaqat, A., Munteanu, C., & Demmans Epp, C. International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education (IJAIED)
2020
Leveraging Peer Support for Mature Immigrants Learning to Write in Informal Contexts
Liaqat, A., & Munteanu, C. 2020 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW '20). ACM, Minneapolis, MN, USA.
2020
Fine Grained Analysis of Students' Online Discussion Posts
Rakovic, M., Marzouk, Z., Liaqat, A., Winne, P. H., & Nesbit, J. C. Computers and Education.
2019
Mature ELLs’ Perceptions Towards Automated and Peer Writing Feedback
Liaqat, A., Akcayir, G., Demmans Epp, & C., Munteanu, C. In: Pammer-Schindler V., Pérez-Sanagustín M., Drachsler H., Elferink R., Scheffel M. (eds) Transforming Learning with Meaningful Technologies. EC-TEL 2019. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer, Cham.
2018
Towards a Writing Analytics Framework for Adult English Language Learners
Liaqat, A., & Munteanu, C. In Proceedings of the Eight International Conference on Learning Analytics and Knowledge (LAK '18). ACM, Sydney, Australia.
2017
Tracing metacognition by highlighting and tagging to predict recall and transfer
Winne, P. H., Nesbit, J. C., Ram, I., Marzouk, Z., Vytasek, J., Samadi, D., Stewart-Alonso, J. Rakovic, M., Liaqat, A., Lin, M. P-C., Mozaffari, Z., & Savoji, A. P. American Educational Research Association, San Antonio, TX.
2016
What if learning analytics were based on learning science?
Marzouk, Z., Rakovic, M., Liaqat, A., Vytasek, J., Samadi, D., Stewart-Alonso, J., Ram, I., Woloshen, S., Winne, P.H. and Nesbit, J.C. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology
Book Chapters
2018
Designing for Older Adults: Overcoming Barriers to a Supportive, Safe, and Healthy Retirement
Munteanu, C., Axtell, B., Rafih, H., Liaqat, A.,& Aly, Y. Pension Research Council.
2017
Designs for learning analytics to support information problem solving
Winne, P. H., Vytasek, J. M., Patzak, A., Rakovic, M., Marzouk, Z., Pakdaman-Savoji, A., Ram I, Samadi D, Lin MP, Liu A, & Liaqat, A. In Informational Environments (pp. 249-272). Springer, Cham.
Workshop Papers and Posters
2024
Drawing on Literary Metaphors to Enhance Social Connection in Hybrid Spaces.
Liaqat, A., & Axtell, B. CHI 2024 Workshop on Envisioning New Futures of Positive Social Technology: Beyond Paradigms of Fixing, Protecting, and Preventing (CHI '24).
2022
What Would Jane Austen Do: Opportunities for Intentional Social Norms in Digital Spaces.
Axtell, B., & Liaqat, A. CHI 2022 Workshop on Social Presence in Virtual Spaces (CHI '22).
2021
Technology Mediated Support for Informal Culture and Language Learning.
Liaqat, A. University of Toronto Graduate Research Day.
2021
In-the-wild Creative Learning: A Case Study on Culture Sharing in Immigrant Families.
Liaqat, A., & Munteanu, C. In Companion of the 2021 Conference on Creativity and Cognition (C\&C '21).
2021
Intersectional Approaches to Designing Educational Technology for Marginalized Populations.
Liaqat, A. Consortium for the Science of Sociotechnical Systems (CSST).
2021
Supporting Casual Language and Culture Learning in Immigrant Families through Storytelling.
Liaqat, A., & Munteanu, C. In Companion of the 2021 Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education (AIED '21). Utrecht, Netherlands.
2021
Hidden Margins: Reflections on Designing with Populations at the Intersection
Liaqat, A., & Munteanu, C. In Companion of the 2021 ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CSCW '21). ACM, Yokohama, Japan.
2019
Social Learning Frameworks for Analyzing Collaboration with Marginalized Learners
Liaqat, A., & Munteanu, C. In Companion of the 2019 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW '19). ACM, Houston, TX, USA.
2019
Hidden margins: Developing new ways of designing for, and with, older adult immigrants
Liaqat, A., & Munteanu, C. In Companion of the 2019 ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '19). ACM, Glasgow, Scotland
2018
Contextual Inquiry, Participatory Design, and Learning Analytics: An Example
Liaqat, A., Axtell, B., Munteanu, C., & Demmans Epp, C. Companion Proceedings 8th International Conference on Learning Analytics & Knowledge (LAK18)
2017
Interactive Writing Analytics
Liaqat, A., Marzouk, Z., Rakovic, M., & Winne, P. H. Workshop on Writing Analytics Literacy at International Conference on Learning Analytics and Knowledge.
Workshops Organized
2021
Designing Interactions for the Ageing Populations – Addressing Global Challenges
Supporting Organizer. In Companion of the 2021 ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CSCW '21). ACM, Yokohama, Japan.
Invited Talks
2023
Designing Social Computing Tools for Creation, Collaboration, and Connection
Princeton University CITP Seminar
2023
Human Computer Interaction Research: How to do Creative Science
IgniteSTEM Closing Keynote
Science Communication
2022
Grandparents and Grandchildren Share their Stories in a Digital Tree of Cultural Heritage
Media
#HowsMyFlattening? Group led by U of T community members creates one-stop shop for COVID-19 data
Amna Liaqat, a PhD candidate in computer science, appreciates the sense of accomplishment she gets from working on the site. “Very often in academia you spend a long time on a problem that can take years to see an effect in the real world,” she says. “Being able to work on a problem that has immediate real-world benefits is very rewarding.”
Read more..
CS faculty and students are key contributors to ‘virtual war room’ for Ontario COVID-19 information
Third-year computer science PhD student Amna Liaqat leads the front-end development of the website and has been working closely with designers to create clear, actionable visualizations using the data gathered for the project. An educational technology researcher by training, Liaqat was excited by the prospect of applying her skills to a new challenge. Read more..
We in Ontario are flying blind’ How top minds teamed up to give us the COVID-19 data the province couldn’t
What do you get when you take an engineer-turned-doctor, an epidemiologist, a data geek, an astrophysicist and add in some keen public health students? You get an ambitious, volunteer-driven Ontario think tank that aims to help provincial leaders and the public understand, in real time, if the province is winning or losing the COVID-19 battle. Read more...