Theme: Beneath The Surface

Our theme is about looking deeper at ourselves, the world around us, and the problems we face. Topics of our event include: Public Health, Industrial Design, Virtual Reality, Big Data, Teenage Homelessness, The Self, and Theatre.

University of Texas at Dallas
800 W Campbell Road
Richardson, Texas, 75080
United States

Brian Roderman

Brian is an Industrial Designer for his own design firm, IN2 Innovation where he's designed various things such as multi-touch fuel dispensers as well as Subway's sandwich oven. This talk will involve the story of how design thinking can solve real world problems like recycling habits for better sustainability efforts.

Duo Contra

Duo Contra is an up and coming Indie/Alternative Rock band based in Dallas, Texas featuring Vocals: Gabriel Jordan, Drums:Gareth Mason, Bass: Karan Bindra, and Guitar: Lukas Bartke.

Nancy Fairbank

Nancy is a sophomore at the University of Texas at Dallas majoring in Political Science. She recently finished her term as VP of Student Government and is involved with various organizations such as Model UN, No Labels, and John Marshall Pre-Law Program among many others. She's really passionate about making a difference in people's lives, especially the homeless youth.

Ryan McMahan

Dr. Ryan P. McMahan is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of Texas at Dallas, where his research focuses on the effects of system fidelity for virtual reality (VR) applications and systems. In his Future Immersive Virtual Environments (FIVE) lab, wireless head-mounted displays (HMDs) and a motion tracking system are used to create high-fidelity VR applications that include head-tracked stereoscopic graphics, 3D sound localization, and tactile feedback via wireless handheld controllers. Dr. McMahan’s current research focuses on the effects of system fidelity for learning and training transfer. This research involves identifying a learning objective, building a VR application to train the tasks involved, and evaluating the amount of training transfer that occurs through objective and subjective measurements.

Seema Yasmin

Dr. Seema Yasmin is an award winning journalist at The Dallas Morning News, a professor of public health at The University of Texas at Dallas and a medical contributor for CNN and NBC Channel 5. Dr. Yasmin trained as a medical doctor at the University of Cambridge in England and as a journalist at the University of Toronto. She served as a disease detective in the Epidemic Intelligence Service at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Sridhar Karra

Sridhar Karra attends the University of Texas at Dallas, majoring in Economics. He is pursuing a career in management consulting.

Thomas Riccio

Thomas Riccio is a post-disciplinary performance artist and Professor of Performance and Aesthetic Studies at the University of Texas at Dallas. He has directed over one hundred plays at American regional theatres, off-off and off Broadway and has worked extensively in the area of indigenous performance conducting research and/or creating performances in: South Africa, Zambia, Burkina Faso, Tanzania, Kenya, Europe, Russia, Siberia, Korea, China, and Alaska. The Peoples Republic of Sakha (central Siberia) declared him a “Cultural Hero”. His writings on performance, ritual, shamanism, and robotics have appeared in numerous international journals, books, and magazines. He is the Poo Pah Doo of Dead White Zombies, a Dallas-based experimental, post-disciplinary performance and media group that utilizes ritual, indigenous and immersion expressions.

William McKnight

William functions as Strategist, Lead Enterprise Information Architect, and Program Manager for sites worldwide utilizing the disciplines of data warehousing, master data management, business intelligence and big data. Many of his clients have gone public with their success stories. He is author of the book “Information Management: Strategies for Gaining a Competitive Advantage with Data.”