School of Computer, Data & Information Sciences

The Ubuntu approach to research

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This essay appeared in the 2021 Fueling Discovery special section of the Wisconsin State Journal on 10/17/21. View the full 2021 Fueling Discovery PDF here.

By Sheriff Issaka

As a first-generation college student in a new country, there were so many unknowns with respect to culture, conduct, academics, interests, foods, accents and more. However, these pale in comparison to navigating a colossal college machinery of more than 45,000 students to find an understanding of myself and the world.

I identified early on that merging my African background with my computer sciences training would help facilitate my navigation and growth process.

I didn’t hesitate to tackle difficult and challenging topics. After presenting on the bigotry promulgated by Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems, including denying people kidney transplants, tagging them as apes and giving them longer prison sentences largely because they were Black, my class instructor introduced me to Reginold Royston, an assistant professor of African Cultural Studies whose work, he said, might interest me.

Read full article here: https://ls.wisc.edu/news/the-ubuntu-approach-to-research