SHASS News

Cultivators of research
“Intelligent, caring, inspiring, and full-of-wisdom,” one student described Kenneth Oye. Another lauded that “We are beyond lucky to have such a caring, supportive, empathetic and compassionate leader” in Maria Yang. Professors Maria Yang and Kenneth Oye are two of the 2023-25 Committed to Caring cohort, acknowledged for encouraging their students; advocating for meaningful, interesting research; […]
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Bridging philosophy and AI to explore computing ethics
During a meeting of class 6.C40/24.C40 (Ethics of Computing), Professor Armando Solar-Lezama poses the same impossible question to his students that he often asks himself in the research he leads with the Computer Assisted Programming Group at MIT: “How do we make sure that a machine does what we want, and only what we want?” At […]
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Study in India shows kids use different math skills at work vs. school
In India, many kids who work in retail markets have good math skills: They can quickly perform a range of calculations to complete transactions. But as a new study shows, these kids often perform much worse on the same kinds of problems as they are taught in the classroom. This happens even though many of […]
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Timeless virtues, new technologies
As the story goes, the Scottish inventor James Watt envisioned how steam engines should work on one day in 1765, when he was walking across Glasgow Green, a park in his hometown. Watt realized that putting a separate condenser in an engine would allow its main cylinder to remain hot, making the engine more efficient […]
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Mishael Quraishi named 2025 Churchill Scholar
MIT senior Mishael Quraishi has been selected as a 2025-26 Churchill Scholar and will undertake an MPhil in archaeological research at Cambridge University in the U.K. this fall. Quraishi, who is majoring in material sciences and archeology with a minor in ancient and medieval studies, envisions a future career as a materials scientist, using archeological […]
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