IU Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering

The Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs recently announced that The City of Frankfort, Indiana and the Town of Nashville have been selected to participate in the second round of the Beat the Heat program, an initiative focused on strengthening community health and resilience during heat emergencies.

The program is led by Dana Habeeb, Luddy Assistant Professor of Informatics and principal investigator for Beat the Heat. The initiative is a partnership between the Luddy School and the Environmental Resilience Institute at Indiana University, bringing together research expertise and community engagement to help Indiana communities better prepare for and respond to extreme heat events.

James H. Rudy Professor of Informatics and Computing Santo Fortunato has been elected to the 2025 class of American Association for the Advancement of Science Fellows, one of the highest honors in the scientific community, recognizing his pioneering contributions to network science, artificial intelligence, and computational social science.

Fortunato was one of 13 Indiana University faculty members selected—the most in a single year in IU history—further highlighting the global impact of Luddy research and scholarship. His work has helped shape emerging fields that influence how researchers study scientific discovery, collaboration, and complex networks around the world.

Information and Library Science students Katherine Surur and Ellie Harrison were selected from a national pool of applicants for competitive internships at the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. this summer through the Junior Fellows Program.

Surur’s internship in the African and Middle East Division is titled “Inventorying Photographs of Political Development Movements in Sub-Saharan Africa.” She will be working with approximately 2000 unprocessed photographs, creating a database for them, and conducting research on different regional locations and events.

Harrison’s internship in the Prints and Photographs Division will focus on a project called “Enhancing Access to Posters.” She'll inventory, research, and create catalog records for a collection of artist-designed posters.

These exciting internship opportunities underscore the national reputation of Luddy’s Information and Library Science program, where students are earning competitive placements at leading institutions.

The Luddy School’s Informatics Mexico City Capstone continues to expand opportunities for student success through immersive, global learning experiences. This spring, 15 informatics students—the program’s largest cohort ever—traveled to Mexico City with Informatics faculty members Logan Paul and Alexis Peirce Caudell to collaborate directly with IU Mexico Gateway on real-world challenges with international impact.

Working across cultures and disciplines, students applied their classroom knowledge in a professional setting while developing solutions for IU’s growing presence in Latin America. Students described the experience as transformational, citing increased motivation, meaningful client engagement, and valuable preparation for their future careers.

Luddy Teach IT student volunteers are helping make STEM learning more accessible (and more fun) through a new robotics initiative with the Boys & Girls Clubs of Bloomington. 🤖

Teach IT is part of the Laurie Burns McRobbie Serve IT Clinic, which connects students with local government agencies and nonprofit organizations through real-world technology projects.

Boys & Girls Clubs leaders praised the initiative for increasing participation and creating meaningful connections between Indiana University students and young learners. Serve IT student volunteers went on to win this year's City of Bloomington, IN - Office of the Mayor Be More Energized Award, which honors an individual or group under the age of 25, for their service to the Boys & Girls Club. 🤍❤️

This summer, Anita Chan will join Indiana University Bloomington as the Luddy Department Chair of Information and Library Science. Chan's research and teaching expertise span globalization and digital cultures, innovation networks and the “periphery”, and feminist and decolonial approaches to technology.

She joins IU from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where she serves as Professor of Information Sciences and founding director of the Community Data Clinic. She is also a Research Fellow at the Charles Babbage Institute and the author of the forthcoming book, "Predatory Data: Eugenics in Big Tech and Our Fight for an Independent Future."

We are excited to welcome Chan and look forward to the vision and leadership she will bring to the IU Luddy Department of Information and Library Science. 🎉

Last month's Cheng Wu Innovation Challenge once again showcased some of the most innovative student-led technology solutions at Indiana University, with judges calling this year’s competition the “best ever.”

Resonix earned first place in the competition for its technical innovation, practical impact, and strong presentation. A sound-based monitoring system developed by Luddy School master’s students Diksh*tha Karanam Madhusudhanprasad, Jahnavi Vemuri, and Preetham Reddy Rallapalli, Resonix detects mechanical failures before breakdowns occurred.