Kathi Fisler

Kathi Fisler is a Research Professor of Computer Science at Brown University, serving as Director of CS Undergraduate Studies and Research Director at Bootstrap. She holds a PhD and MS from Indiana University and a BA from Williams College. Her research focuses on computing education, formal methods, and data-centric approaches, emphasizing how people learn formal systems. She leads efforts to integrate socially-responsible computing across Brown’s CS curriculum and collaborates on Bootstrap’s K-12 outreach programs. Key projects include data-centric computing education, notional machines, and policy analysis tools like Margrave.

Education:

• PhD in Computer Science, Indiana University (1996)
• MS in Computer Science, Indiana University (1992)
• BA in Computer Science, Williams College (1991)

Research Interests:

• Data-centric computing education
• Computing education pedagogy
• Formal methods for hardware and security
• Socially-responsible computing curriculum design
• Bootstrap K-12 outreach initiatives

Teaching:

• CSCI 0050: Data-Centric Programming
• CSCI 0200: Data Structures & Algorithms
• CSCI 2952B: Computer Science Education Research

Awards:

• Best Paper Award at Koli Calling 2017
• Best Paper Award at SIGCSE 2011

Labs/Teams:

• Brown Computing Education Research Group
• Bootstrap (K-12 outreach)