Ashley Hart is a third-year Computer Science Ph.D. student in the Computing for Social Good Lab at the University of Florida. She is under the advisement of Dr. Juan E. Gilbert and is a recipient of the Florida Education Fund McKnight and GEM Fellowships. Her research interests include digital game-based learning, AI literacy for children, culturally relevant computing, access to quality education, and artificial intelligence. Video games opened the door for Ashley’s fascination with computing, and she uses her passion for art, writing, programming, and service to conduct research that will encourage children to link what they are learning in the classroom to STEM careers.
Ashley graduated from the University of Central Florida (UCF) in May 2022 with a B.S. in Computer Science. While at UCF, she conducted undergraduate summer research at UVA and Rutgers University. Ashley also researched Turing machines at UCF and served as a founder and president of the ACM SIGACT chapter at UCF. Ashley was also a UCF McNair Scholar, a UCF Office of Diversity and Inclusion DIVE and IMAGE Scholar, and a NSBE Scholar. She managed and contributed code, art, and animations to two video games and front-end UI development to two winning hackathon projects. She has also mentored several students.
Ashley’s mission is to be a force for positive change in the lives of others, especially up-and-coming youth. Her work promotes access to quality contemporary curriculums for K-12 students in underserved communities interested in STEM.