HCIL Celebrates 25th Anniversary with Proclamation from Governor O’Malley (College Park, MD 5/30/08)

To kickoff the Annual Human-Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL) Symposium, the HCIL received a proclamation from Mr. Martin O’Malley, Governor of Maryland. A special ceremony was held to present the proclamation to Dr. Alison Druin, Director of the HCIL. She received the proclamation along with Dr. Mel Bernstein, Vice President for Research, University of Maryland and Dr. Ben Shneiderman, Professor, Computer Science, University of Maryland.

Governor O’Malley proclaimed , "The sparks of innovation have been steadily emerging for 25 years from the Human-Computer Interaction Lab at the University of Maryland. Founded in 1983, this group of devoted faculty, outstanding staff, and energetic students has a remarkable record of innovative contributions that have influenced most modern information and communications technologies.”

The two-day symposium, May 29-30, 2008, featured talks about cutting-edge research being conducted at the HCIL. One of the highlights this year was a special keynote panel, "25 Years of HCI, 25 Years of the HCIL." Panelists included Richard Anderson, Editor-in-Chief, Interactions Magazine; Dr. Ken Perlin, Founding Director & Professor, NYU Media Research Lab; and Clare-Marie Karat, Research Staff Member, Policy Technologies Department, IBM TJ Watson Research Center.

Other opportunities for involvement included poster presentations and a tour of the new research facility. A wide variety of tutorials and workshops were available. Other talks were given by faculty and students of the HCIL which included work on emergency response systems, cloud computing, social networks, ethics, older adults’ health information, and digital libraries for children. Later the new facilities were opened up for demos and posters of current work.