PhD Student Spotlight: Pramod Chundury
Meet PhD Student, Pramod Chundury!
After graduating from the iSchool’s HCIM program in 2017, Pramod Chundury spent a year gaining valuable professional experience as a user researcher for Facebook. During his time at Facebook, Pramod realized that he wanted to further develop his HCI skills and broaden his formal research experiences. Pramod returned to the iSchool in pursuit of his PhD in 2018. His research interests lie at the intersection of informatics and HCI, specifically aimed at the development of data visualization models to help broader audiences understand complex topics. He has also found joy in mentoring undergraduate students while working as a teaching assistant, and volunteering at the UMD Human-Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL) to produce videos of the HCIL’s Brown Bag Lunches, a weekly speaker series dedicated to a variety of information science and HCI topics. Pramod was awarded two iSchool travel awards and a research improvement grant (RIG) to propel his research ventures, including his inaugural presentation at CHI 2017. He has found solace in the iSchool’s collaborative and vibrant research community, with support from his faculty advisor, Niklas Elmqvist, and former advisor, Eun Kyoung Choe. In his spare time, Pramod enjoys experimenting with cooking and avidly following soccer.