Professor and Chair
Department of Software and Information Systems
College of Computing and Informatics
University of North Carolina Charlotte
m.maher [at] uncc.edu

Honorary Professor of Design Computing
Design Lab
Faculty of Architecture, Design, and Planning
The University of Sydney
marylou.maher [at] sydney.edu.au


New Course

Teaching in Spring 2013: Tangible Design Studio

Keynote Speaker:

European Conference of Technology Enhanced Learning (EC-TEL 2012), September 2012.

Interview on Youtube

An interview about 21st Century Learning Skills after the EC-TEL keynote talk: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7pb948ZZhE

Latest publications:

Paulini, M., Murty, P. and Maher, M.L. (2012) Design processes in collective innovation communities: a study of communication, accepted for publication in CoDesign International Journal of CoCreation in Design and the Arts. pdf

Maher, M.L. and Fisher, D.H. (2012). Using AI to Evaluate Creative Designs, In Proceedings of International Conference on Creative Design, pp 45-54. pdf

Current working papers:

Paulini, M., Maher, M.L., and Murty, P. Motivating participation in online innovation communities, submitted for publication. pdf


Brief bio:

My academic career has taken a path that started in Engineering, through Architecture and Design Computing, and more recently Computer Science and Information Studies. My research and teaching has centered on the design and evaluation of innovative digital/physical environments and new media that enhance information systems, creativity and design. My current focus is on developing models and new technology as we scale up from human-computer interaction, through collaborative systems, to large-scale collective intelligence in design. Some highlights of my recent research are computational models for recognising and evaluating creativity, the development and evaluation of cognitive impact of a Tangible Tabletop System for collaborative design; DesignWorld, a virtual world for collaborative design; the development of a computational model of curiosity and its role in Motivated Reinforcement Learning.

While at NSF, 2006-2010, I started a funding program CreativeIT and co-chaired the Cyber-Enabled Discovery and Innovation Program. I was a Program Director in the Human-Centered Computing Cluster. In 2008 I became a member of Senior Executive Services was appointed as Deputy Director of the Division of Information and Intelligent Systems.

While Professor of Design Computing and Co-Director of the Key Centre of Design Computing and Cognition at the University of Sydney, I developed and implemented an innovative Bachelor degree in design computing, I was Chair of the Department of Architectural and Design Science, as Co-Director of the Key Center I led a group of 11 academics in developing teaching and research in design computing and cognition, and I taught research methods in the School of Information Technology and in Design Computing. I assisted in the development of a research program for the Collaborative Research Centre for Construction Innovation and in the start up of the Humans Understanding Machines group at National ICT Australia.