e. jessie dot taft at gmail dot com
t. 1 203 654 9428
Work Experience
Research Initiative Coordinator
Cornell Tech
July 2018-Present
I manage finances, grants, external and corporate relations, events, and other matters for the Digital Life Initiative and the Connected Experiences Lab.
Research Assistant
Dept of Information Science, Cornell University
February 2017-June 2018
I studied questions of digital privacy, algorithmic discrimination, inequality, interpersonal bias, and design with Drs. Karen Levy and Solon Barocas.
- Content coding legal and academic research on technology and privacy to understand research methods and collaboration networks in these fields
- Co-authoring ethical exploration of causes, effects, and solutions to discrimination on dating apps
- Collected and synthesized data on web and app design features that cause or stop discrimination
Lab Manager
Cornell Social Media Lab, Dept of Communication, Cornell Univ
June 2012 - July 2018
I acted as project manager and research aide for studies developed by faculty and graduate students to explore the intersection of new technologies and human behavior. I worked on over 30 projects over 6 years.
- Support collaborations with academic, non-profit, and corporate partners, including assisting with grant applications and establishing workflows for data sharing, reporting, and outcome delivery
- Recruit, supervise, evaluate, and mentor undergraduate research assistants - over 100 over 6 years
- Draft white papers, blog posts, outreach materials, and presentations; field press inquiries
- Coordinate research and experiment facilities and equipment, facilitate meetings and other events
- Ensure ethical and data security compliance for research projects
- Supervise study design and data collection via Amazon MTurk, surveys, experiments, interviews, and other methods; promote best practices for data analysis and interpretation using R and other tools
Social Media TestDrive Project Manager
Cornell Social Media Lab, Dept of Communication, Cornell Univ
June 2017 - July 2018
I managed the development of a platform that helps kids ages 10-13 learn to use social media in a safe, realistic, and accessible interactive environment.
- Supervise 10-person team developing interactive lessons for kids and curriculum materials for educators, as well as marketing and outreach materials
- Coordinate strategic collaborations with academic and non-profit partners
- Collect feedback from kids and educators via interviews, surveys, and focus groups; synthesize findings into concrete improvements to the platform
Assistant to the Editor-in-Chief
ACM Transactions on Graphics
March 2015 - July 2018
I assist Dr. Kavita Bala with the management of the premier journal in the field of computer graphics.
- Maintain timely and high-quality submission, peer review, and publication processes
- Assist in implementing several successful new initiatives, including yearly Editorial Board meetings, a replicability review process, and anonymous discussion mechanisms for reviewers
Research Assistant
Cornell Social Media Lab, Cornell University
October 2010 - May 2012
Assisted with literature review, study design, data collection and analysis, and other tasks for Dr. Natalie Bazarova.
Peer-Reviewed Publications
- DiFranzo, D., Choi, Y.H., Purington, A., Taft, J.G., Whitlock, J., & Bazarova, N.N. (under review). Social Media TestDrive: Real-world social media education for the next generation. Under review at CHI 2019.
- Hutson, J.A., Taft, J.G., Barocas, S., & Levy, K. (2018). Debiasing desire: Addressing bias and discrimination on intimate platforms. Proceedings of CSCW 2018.
- Purington, A., Taft, J.G., Sannon, S., Bazarova, N.N., & Taylor, S.H. (2017). Alexa is my new BFF: Social roles, user satisfaction, and personification of the Amazon Echo. In Proceedings of the 2017 ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI'17), pp 2853-2859.
- Bazarova, N.N., Taft, J.G., Choi, Y.H., & Cosley, D. (2013). Managing impressions and relationships on Facebook: Self-presentational and relational concerns revealed through an analysis of language style. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 32, 121-141.
Refereed Posters and Other Publications
- Sannon, S., Choi, Y.H., Taft, J.G., & Bazarova, N.N. (2017). What comments did I get? How post and comment characteristics predict interaction satisfaction on Facebook. Presented at the 2017 AAAI International Conference on Web & Social Media (ICWSM '18), Montreal, Canada.
- Purington, A., Taft, J.G., Sannon, S., Bazarova, N.N., & Taylor, S.H. (2017). "Alexa is my new BFF": A case study of the Amazon Echo's social functions and roles. Extended Abstract for the Workshop on Talking with Conversational Agents in Collaborative Action, ACM CSCW 2017.
Other Awards, Activities, & Presentations
- Jan 2016 - July 2018. Social Media Stories: News and Research from the Social Media Lab at Cornell University. Wrote all unattributed posts, edited posts by students.
- March 2018. ARDVARC: Antimicrobial resistance data visualization and rapid classification. Won the Best Data Visualization prize at the 2018 Health Hackathon at Cornell University, and was a top 10 overall finalist.
- April 2016. Resources for understanding digital technology use among young people. Webinar presented to New York State youth development professionals.
Media
Technical Skills
- Programming: Python, Java, JavaScript, HTML/CSS, machine learning & data science techniques
- Research: Amazon Mechanical Turk, Dedoose, Zotero, LaTex
- Graphics & Visualization: Tableau, D3.js, Unity Engine & VR Technologies, Photoshop
- Office: Microsoft and Google Office Suites