IU Informatics’ Team Takes First Place in International Student Design Competition

A student team from Indiana University’s School of Informatics won first place this week in the International Student Design Competition, sponsored by the Association for Computing Machinery’s Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction (SIGCHI). The team — which includes master’s students Shweta Aneja, Kevin Makice, Apurva Pangam and Matt Weldon — was honored with a first place finish over top schools such as UC Irvine and Savannah College of Art (tied for second) and Carnegie-Mellon University (fourth place).

The second annual competition is a three-phase, six month process, which ultimately brings a select few teams to the CHI conference. IU’s winning team was one of four IU teams — all human-computer interaction graduate students — selected to attend the second round of competition in Portland, Ore., after beating out national and international teams in the first round.

Student teams from all over the globe were invited to submit their written solutions to this year’s research challenge: create a design for artificial companionship to support the social well-being of seniors above the age of 65.

This year’s winning team proposed Project mPath, a volunteer network to be implemented within assisted-living facilities. As part of the project, volunteers would assess social relationships and emotional reactions, inputting information into the system, which would examine data over time to isolate anomalies, highlight trends and anticipate future responses.

Other IUB teams include:

• Team Echo: Justin Donaldson, Josh Evnin and Sidharth Saxena.

  Project Description: The Echoes project is a two-part system that includes: a “Teletable,” a virtual extension of the kitchen or family table that allows users to organize digital photos, play games with peers, write letters, store recipes and more; and a “Pitara,” a portable device to house digital media and mementos.

• Team KRJN: Jacki Bauer, Kristy Streefkerk and Ryan Varick.

  Project Description: Team KRJN proposed “fridgets.” Fridgets are digital refrigerator magnets that provide access to a wealth of information and services, such as reminders, daily news and weather updates, entertainment, photos of loved ones and more.

• Team Meeteetse: Kynthia Brunette, Matt Eisenstadt, Erik Pukinskis and Will Ryan.

  Project Description: Project Meeteetse proposed a set of enhancements that will create a bridge between the home and the community. The design, to be applied to a local community center, allows seniors to share photos with others and keeps them updated on community events through a dynamic home scheduling system.

The conference teams’ written proposals will be published in the Student Competition section of the Extended Abstracts conference publication. Top entries in the competition earned a Certificate of Recognition.

CHI 2004 was held in Vienna, Austria, where IU Informatics teams took second and fourth place.