[Sept -2022] Joining Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University as an affiliate

I wiill be joining Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University as an affiliate this fall and looking forward to expanding my research collaborations in addressing prevailing socio-technical issues.

https://cyber.harvard.edu/people/dilrukshi-gamage

[July -2022] Won the best performance of overall at the Datathon - IC2S2 2022, Chicago, USA 

[May -2022] Invited to deliver a talk to empower IEEE women in engineering 

It was indeed an honor to be invited to speak at St.Joseph's College of Engineering IEEE Student Branch Chapter Chennai India.
#IEEE especially #WIE (Women in Engineering) played a huge role in my student days and now in my early career as well.
I spoke about the opportunities and challenges I faced and shared some of my successes to encourage young female undergraduates to pursue and thrive in STEM.

[Dec -2021] Officially Graduated. 

My PhD research featured in the University web  - ​https://uom.lk/highlighted-researchers/PhD-2021-Convocation
Supper proud to be in the AD Scientific index list as ranked #28 from UoM  - https://www.adscientificindex.com/?university=University+of+Moratuwa​
LinkedIn - ​www.linkedin.com/posts/dilrukshigamage_hci-research-phd-activity-6880038535953551360-cfDX
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[Jul -2021] I am honored to be the first spotlight on the TechVoices Series organize by Diversity Collective and Arteculate. 
In 2014, I took the decision to pursue my Ph.D. in a local university despite having full scholarship offers from Japan and US. It was a well-thought decision I took as a young mother to two baby girls. Naysayers were always there to underestimate the power of tech women and particularly, I had targeted harassments from local and not surprisingly international as well, despite all I continue and stay focus on what interests me - which is research. I kept growing, learning and exploring my potentials -
  • 2014 - I won ACM- W scholarship - went to Japan, had my first publication related to Ph.D.
  • 2015 - I was awarded the ACM Richard Tapia Diversity Scholarship - My first trip to the US. I was fortunate to meet Prof. Michael Bernstein at Stanford in person and it was my first physical HCI moment.
  • 2016 - I was awarded the IEEE IAS scholarship went to Canada
  • 2017 - IEEE women in engineering WIE ILC grant / also for 2018
  • 2017- Google Women Tech Makers Scholarship in Google office Korea - I met wonderful powerful strong women in tech circle across APAC ( WTM 2017 love you all)
  • 2017 - I was selected as one of 200 aspiring researchers across the globe to the Heidelberg Laureate Forum in Germany and also offered 2000Euros from the forum fund to travel as I was coming from Sri Lanka. Met brilliant Nobel laureates in the field of Computer Science and Mathematics.
  • 2018 - I was awarded the Anita Borg Scholarship to the Grace Hopper Conference in Texas US.
  • 2020 - I was selected as the Rising Stars by UC Berkeley, if it wasn't for the pandemic, my women in tech network would have much expanded. Fortunate to meet Prof. Katie Bouman the woman behind the first blackhole image, who provided mentoring at the program. it was such a wow moment.
In between these years, many other grants, fellowships which provided me enough to explore the world, meet world-class researchers, learn from all - traveled 13 different countries - all while living and studying in Sri Lanka. I wanted to break the contextual perceptions of the physical location,which I want to believe that location is independent to what you desired to follow.

[Jun -2021] Invited to serve as an Associate Chair (AC) for the CHI2022 - subcommittee  Learning, Education and Families

[Jan -2021] Facilitating and leading paper discussion at Oxford Reproducibility Journal Club

I am  honored to be facilitating research paper and be in the organizing team at the Oxford reproducibility group  https://reproducibilitea.org/ at https://ox.ukrn.org/eventsox.ukrn.org/events//  

[Dec -2020] Invited to serve as an Associate Chair (AC) for the CHI2021 Late Breaking Work (LBW)

The ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems is the premier international conference on Human-Computer Interaction. CHI – pronounced ‘kai’ – is a place where researchers and practitioners gather from across the world to discuss the latest in interactive technology. CHI is generally considered the most prestigious in the field of HCI and attracts thousands of international attendees annually. 

This is my 3rd time been an AC at the CHI  LBW  - ​https://chi2021.acm.org/    

[Nov -2020] Became a finalist for the WomenTech Network Rising Star in STEM of the Year Award 2020

Web link - ​https://www.linkedin.com/posts/womentech-network_womenintech-womentechnet-wtga2020-activity-6735205194361004032-rkOa

[Nov -2020] Got accepted to Early Career Researcher fellowship  Future Digileaders 2020

Web Link - https://www.digitalfutures.kth.se/events/future-digileaders/

[Oct -2020] Got accepted to Research Sprint by Berkman Klein Center at Harvard University

Web link -  ​https://cyber.harvard.edu/story/2020-10/research-sprint-participants-explore-digital-transformation-time-crisis-focus

Only 40 applicants been selected from 500+ applications 

[Sept -2020] I got selected to Rising Stars at UC Berkeley 2020

Link to the web  -www2.eecs.berkeley.edu/risingstars/2020/participants/groupG-H.shtml
Rising Stars is an intensive workshop aimed at increasing the numbers of women interested in pursuing academic careers in computer science, computer engineering and electrical engineering.  This annual event was launched at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2012 and previously hosted by UC Berkeley in 2014.
Participants are selected based on academic excellence, interest in a faculty career in the EECS discipline, and commitment to advancing equity and inclusion.

[Sept- 2020] Open Science certificate in recognition of taking part in initiative that driving toward Open Research and Open Science practice and contribute to the region

[Sept 2020] Selected to serve as a Associate Chair for #CSCW2021 - a top ranked HCI conference 

Selected to Late-Breaking Work Committee for ACM SIG CHI2020 - Hawaii, USA
Selected and offered travel grant to take part in a second winter school of Writing a research paper to SIG CHI 2021 held in NSU Dhaka, Bangladesh, November 2019
This workshop provided a comprehensive knowledge on research methods in depth to quantitative  and qualitative approaches by Prof. Anirudha Joshi - IIT Bombay and Jackie O'Neil Principal researcher from Microsoft India and via skype Shamsi from Microsoft Richmond DC about the CHI process.  
Selected and offered scholarship to the Oxford Berlin Summer School held at the Oxford University, England in September 2019
During the one week long summer school,extensive practical knowledge on reproducible research methods and tools with hands on experience were covered including #R for reproducible data #Phython #Jypeter 
At the same time much valued interactions with Oxford and Berlin researchers who are experts in fields such as Phycology , neuroscience, MRIImage processing was very much insightful.

Selected and offered Special Interest Group of Computers Human International (SIGCHI) travel grants to take part in HCI Human Computer Interaction Summer Schools in North South University Dhaka Bangladesh and IIT Bombay India.

Received JTELSS2019 Scholarship award to take part in EATEL2019 Summer School in Bari Italy
JTELSS is a summer program organize by European Association of Technology Enhanced Learning (EATEL) every year (https://ea-tel.eu/).This year it is scheduled in Bari Italy. 
During 7 days of the week in June, it was amazing to learn and interact with prominent researcher around europe and to learn new knowledge. 
Serving in the Committee IEEE Women In Engineering International Leadership Conference 2019 Austin USA - WIE ILC2019
As a passion for serving to the under represented groups in STEM, I have been selected and offered volunteer grant for 2 consecutive years. This was a very competitive Women leadership conference founded by Nita Patel in CA, USA http://ieee-wie-ilc.org/. 
This year I am honored to contribute  more professionally as a part of the ILC committee who lead behind the screen of every activity to bring this conference a success.  
Selected to Late-Breaking Work Committee for CHI2019 - Glasgow UK
Selected to serve in the committee for the top tier HCI conference by ACM SIG CHI - https://sigchi.org/  at ​http://chi2019.acm.org
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Serving the Grace Hopper Celebration  Committee - Human Computer Interaction 

2018 Sept - Awarded the scholarship from Grace Hoppers Conference 2018 

In 2018, I was awarded the full scholarship to attend the conference among 2000+ applications. ​
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I have been selected as the committee for reviewing the HCI track in GHC 2017 and 2018. 

2018 May - Selected to IEEE Women in Engineering International Leadership Conference 2018 in San Jose CA, USA Volunteering team 

http://ieee-wie-ilc.org/ IEEE WIE ILC in the # 1 conference geared towards empowering women in STEM, I  am honored to be selected for the volunteering team for the second time from Sri Lanka. It is a competitive grant offered funding for traveling, fully waived  registration fee with exposure to work with with higher and mid tier career female leadership.  

2018 May - Graduated from Mozilla Open Leaders program  

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https://medium.com/read-write-participate/meet-our-open-leadership-grads-232800db1e21
Hosted a site for Global Sprint Mozilla and also lead a project collaborating with Mark Whiting, a post doctoral student at Stanford University. 
Our Interview with Mozilla is in - 
Mozilla Demo Call Presentation - ​https://air.mozilla.org/mozsprint-demos-option-b-yolowolo/#@51m55s
Mozilla recap of all the hosted sites including Colombo with my reflections -

2018 April - Awarded Global OER Graduate Network Fellowship 

Fellowship to take part in the Global Open Education Resource Graduate Network 2 days workshop and present research in the 4 days conference in Open Education Global at TU Delft Netherlands 22-26th April 2018.

Selected as a Young Researcher for Heidelberg Laureate Forum 2017

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The Heidelberg Laureate Forum Foundation (HLFF) annually organizes the Heidelberg Laureate Forum (HLF), which is a networking event for mathematicians and computer scientists from all over the world.The winners of the most prestigious awards in Mathematics and Computer Science, the Abel Prize, the Fields Medal (including the Nevanlinna Prize for contributions in “Mathematical Aspects of Information Science”), the ACM A.M. Turing Award and the ACM Prize in Computing are invited to participate in the Forum.
Each year the Scientific Committee of the Heidelberg Laureate Forum Foundation decides on a topical focus for the upcoming forum. This is done in close communication with the laureates.
Once the focus has been defined, applications from young scientists for participation in the forum are solicited. The first phase of the application process is primarily handled by the award granting organizations, supported by the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies, Mathematisches Forschungszentrum Oberwolfach and by Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz Center for Informatics. The candidates proposed by these organizations will be reviewed by the Foundation’s Scientific Board, which will make the final decision. After those processes this year around 200 YR were selected from around the world. I am the only Sri Lankan got selected to this 2017. 
In this video, captured my interaction questions with SAP as a young researcher 45:20 frame. 

Awarded Google Teckmaker APAC Scholarship 2017

 AKA Anita Borg Memorial Scholarship - A group of female undergraduate and graduate students will be chosen from the applicant pool, and scholarships will be awarded based on the strength of each candidate's impact on diversity, demonstrated leadership and academic background. All scholarship recipients will be invited to attend the annual Women Techmakers Scholars' Retreat in one Google’s Asia Pacific offices in 2017 to connect with fellow scholars, network with Googlers and participate in a number of workshops.
Experience sharing through - ​https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-become-google-wtm-scholar-aka-anita-borg-memorial-gamage/

3rd Shape your career program successfully conducted with the immense support from Fordue and IEEE WIE Student Branch Affinity Group SLIIT

Shape your career is a project I initiated to promote women empowerment and to help young undergraduates to meet indutry expert leaders and network, learn and share experience. 3rd program took place at Fortude with their sponsorship ( A brandix company) and invited speaker "The Woman Entrepreneur" -Linda Speldewinde founder of AOD Sri Lanka/Fashionmarket.lk

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Represented IEEE Sri Lanka section in the IEEE Section Congress in Sydney.  Won the pitch competition at IEEE Panel of Conference, Hyatt Sydney 

IEEE Section congress is the biggest event for IEEE where all the sections (~300) around the world take part to learn share and network with each other. 1500+ Delegates attend and 3 delegates represented Sri Lanka Section( IEEE SL Chair Elect, Section Student representative and Industry relations coordinator / Asst Treasurer) . Apart from the main conference, I was awarded a place at the POCO conference happen just before the Section congress. I collaborated with IEEE Boston Section on a idea and our pitch won the competition.   
Awarded the IEEE Women in Engineering International Leadership Conference (WIE ILC 2017 San Jose CA) Volunteering scholarship ( May 2017)
Selected from a competitive scholarship grant to attend and volunteer for the ILC 2017 Women in Engineering conference in San Jose International Convention Centre. Only 2 Sri Lankan's were selected this year and last year there was no representation from Sri Lanka. 

Invited as a panelist in Women Internet Governance Forum (IGF) 2017 Sri Lanka to talk about Governance issues in relating to women 16th May 2017

Initiated and implemented a new program in IEEE WIE - "Shape your Career" and first event happened on 15th May 2017. 

I was able to connect with CAKELABS to sponsor the event and selected USCS WIE branch in assisting in hosting the event.
This program empowered female undergraduates to understand what leadership means for technical girls and how can they face challenges by sharing experience with the distinguish speaker. Dr.Jeewika Ranweera from Oracle San Jose,USA, Mr.Nirmal Kumarasiri, Nilka Aluthge from CAKELABS.   
Presented the research work in progress at ACM Learning@scale conference hosted by MIT, Boston, USA. 18th April 2017
During this trip I was able to make exciting events -
1. Meeting Prof.Scott Klemmer - the very first #HCI course I took in 2012, the reason behind my whole MOOC interest 
2. Meeting most of the Stanford Worldwide Crowd research team - for more than 2 years I have been working with them online but this time I could meet them in person at MIT
3. Meeting Prof. Anant Agrawal, CEO of edX, Inc and had a great discussion about how learning experience really look like and how it should look like ;)
Selected to the event "Smart@work" by School of Engineering Sciences of the Technische Universität Dresden, Germany for a week long fully funded program on Human Technology Corporation.
http://smartatwork.org/
Selected to be in the reviewer committee in HCI (Human Computer Interaction) track for the largest Women in Computing Conference GHC2017
ASPCE Merit Scholarship at ICCE 2016 conference IIT, Mumbai December 2nd, 2016
for Outstanding Performance and Dedication 

University of Moratuwa Annual Award Ceremony   November 18th, 2016
Special recognition of international level award - for a winning best paper in an international conference

Speaker at the APNIC42 Conference - Women in ICT

I was invited for an interactive session tackling the big questions relating to gender and industry participation in the Asia Pacific.  5th October 2016 at Hilton Colombo  

​Web- https://conference.apnic.net/42/program#/speakers
News - https://blog.apnic.net/2016/10/18/dont-leave-crown-garage/

Scholarship Award to participate in Richard Tapia Diversity in Computer Science Conference - Austin, Texas, USA 2016 - September

Scholarship award to travel and accommodation and I happen to be the first Sri Lankan to be awarded to this conference.  
Pictures of the event - https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10154622006339379.1073741941.595874378&type=1&l=4a194b647c

PROFESSOR WIDOM'S INSTRUCTIONAL ODYSSEY - Main organizer 

Jennifer Widom, Stanford computer science professor is offering free in person courses workshops on Design thinking and Big Data. I organized and arranged of her first ever event in Sri Lanka in corporation with IEEE Sri Lanka section. Event took place during August 24th to 29th in Colombo and Kandy.
http://www.professorwidom.org/
Her first Medium post on the event 
Facebook page of the event 

IEEE WIE Tech Forum 2016
Founder and Main organizer 

Event web - http://wietechforum.xyz/
Event FB Page - ​https://www.facebook.com/wietechforum/_

Design thinking Techtalk at Brandixi3

Tech Talk at SLASSCOM 

Tech talk in the UX Meetup 

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ACM-W Scholarship Award in 2014

In recognition to the research contributions in MOOC, awarded the scholarship to attend top tier Educational conference in Japan and present the research work. 

Acceptance for the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in computing conference  George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston, TX on October 14-162015  

Rated 8.7/10 from the reviewers  for the submission.

Scholarship to attend  Design Thinking for Innovative Problem Solving: A Step by Step Project by Darden School of Business, University of Virginia

Formed IEEE - WIE (Women In Engineering)  Sri Lanka Section - Plays a key role in the Committee - Information Management 

Acceptance for the participation in the highly competitive prestigious  IEEE  R10 Student / Young Professional / WIE congress 2015