By Hannah Stewart (Comm鈥�19)
Photos by Kimberly Coffin (CritMedia, StratComm鈥�18)
Before Andrew Schwartz knew he鈥檇 be an information science major, he had already attended a class. Now, he鈥檚 graduating鈥攚ith a second major in philosophy鈥攁s the College of Media, Communication and Information's William W. White Outstanding Graduate.
Faced with a plethora of potential fields, it was a lecture by Morgan Klaus Scheuerman (PhDInfo鈥�23) that initially attracted Schwartz to the field. 
The discussion focused on ethics, machine learning and gender鈥攁nd created a sense of curiosity to explore more topics through the lens of data.
鈥淚 chose information science because I am interested not just in computing, but computing as a social and cultural phenomenon,鈥� he said. 鈥淚nfo gives us the skills to look at topics from a lot of different domains with a critical thinking lens and data-driven quantitative perspective, and that鈥檚 a skill that鈥檚 broadly applicable.鈥澨�
The White Outstanding Graduate award honors the CMCI student with the highest overall GPA in his or her graduating class. Schwartz鈥檚 academic record is important to him, but more important is the societal impacts of both technology and his work. In the middle of the pandemic, that meant connecting with The COVID Tracking Project, whose data were used by news organizations, two presidential administrations and an array of federal agencies鈥攊ncluding the CDC and FDA.
鈥淲orking on this project kick-started me thinking that I can actually make things with code that are useful for people,鈥� he said.
As a first-year student, he assisted Robin Burke, professor and chair of information science, in studying fairness in recommender systems. Not only was he able to quickly understand the platform they used for conducting machine learning experiments, but he also helped make improvements to the software that increased its efficiency. Moreover, despite ongoing releases of the software, Schwartz鈥檚 code is still supporting it.
鈥淗is interest in philosophy was one of the things that attracted him to our research group, which looks at fairness and other ethical dimensions of recommender systems,鈥� Burke said. 鈥淔or our department as a whole, ethical and critical reflection is a key value, so I think that鈥檚 one reason info was a good fit for Andrew.鈥�
Thanks to his work with Burke as well as developing a relationship with Brian Keegan, he was able to take both his experience and his education abroad as an invited researcher at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid.
鈥淚nfo gives us the skills to look at topics from a lot of different domains with a critical thinking lens and data-driven quantitative perspective, and that鈥檚 a skill that鈥檚 broadly applicable.鈥�
Andrew Schwartz
鈥淚 studied in Seville for my junior year and completed most of my philosophy coursework while I was in Spain,鈥� Schwartz said. 鈥淥ne of the priorities for me was language acquisition and immersion. So, I lived in Madrid over the following summer and did a research collaboration with Brian鈥檚 colleagues鈥擜ndrea Pe帽a-Calvin, Javier Arroyo and Samer Hassan鈥攁nd we got published this spring.鈥�
In Spain, he and the team studied how online communities govern and organize themselves. This experience, and others, emphasized to him the myriad ways data touch various fields, as well as the critical thinking skills needed to leverage technology effectively.听
That鈥檚 something he feels he developed through both his majors.
鈥淲hen it comes to impact and being able to make something I鈥檓 proud of, a big part of that is being able to make technology for the people to use it, and make things that people enjoy using and improve their lives,鈥� he said. 鈥淚nfo places a big emphasis on that.鈥�