West is an associate professor at the Information School and the inaugural director of the new Center. He is a co-founder of the DataLab, the nexus for research on Data Science and Analytics. West develops data mining techniques for studying the Science of Science, where he investigates the origins of scholarly disciplines, the social and economic biases that drive these disciplines, and the impact of the current publication system. Currently, his research focuses on misinformation specifically in and about science.

https://jevinwest.org/

Calo is a faculty co-director (with Batya Friedman and Tadayoshi Kohno) of the UW Tech Policy Lab, a unique, interdisciplinary research unit that spans the School of Law, Information School, and Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering. Professor Calo holds courtesy appointments at the UW Information School and the Oregon State University School of Mechanical, Industrial, and Manufacturing Engineering.

Calo’s research on law and emerging technology appears or is forthcoming in leading law reviews (California Law Review, University of Chicago Law Review, and Columbia Law Review) and technical publications (MIT Press, Nature, Artificial Intelligence) and is frequently referenced by the mainstream media (NPR, New York Times, Wall Street Journal). Professor Calo has testified before the full Judiciary and Commerce Committees of the United States Senate and the German Parliament and has organized events on behalf of the National Science Foundation, the National Academy of Sciences, and the Obama White House. He has been a speaker at President Obama’s Frontiers Conference, the Aspen Ideas Festival, and NPR’s Weekend in Washington.

https://www.law.uw.edu/directory/faculty/calo-ryan

Coward is Senior Principal Research Scientist at the University of Washington Information School, director of the Technology & Social Change Group, and co-founder of the Center for an Informed Public. Chris studies issues of information access, digital inclusion, digital skills, and civic engagement, primarily in resource-limited populations and countries. Much of his work focuses on these issues in the context of public libraries. His current work examines misinformation and civic discourse, with the aim of developing new library programs and services that respond to today’s more fractious information dynamics. He is interested in the integration of digital and physical spaces as a way of fostering more constructive engagements with information.

https://tascha.uw.edu/people/chris-coward/

Spiro is an assistant professor at the Information School, a co-director of the Social Media Lab (SoMeLab) and a co-director of the DataLab. Spiro’s research involves the collection and analysis of large-scale social and behavioral data to answer key questions within the areas of sociology, information science, and social computing. Since early 2012, her work has focused on understanding information-related behaviors in the context of crisis events, including rumors, misinformation and collective sensemaking in online environments. This work has twice been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

https://ischool.uw.edu/people/faculty/profile/espiro

Starbird is associate professor in the Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering. Her research is situated within human-computer interaction (HCI) and the emerging field of crisis informatics—the study of the how information-communication technologies (ICTs) are used during crisis events. One aspect of her research focuses on how online rumors spread during natural disasters and man-made crisis events. More recently, she has begun to focus on disinformation and other forms of strategic information operations online. In 2018, she received a National Science Foundation CAREER Award for research in this area.

https://www.hcde.washington.edu/starbird