Attending ACM CHI 2017 was an enlightening experience, and I felt honored to be surrounded by some of the most innovative HCI minds. I heard many talks on social innovation in technology (my primary area of interest), attended a course on color theory, and witnessed several fascinating plenaries. My team competed in the Student Design Competition. We presented the poster of our concept, and after being selected as 1 of the 4 finalist teams, presented a keynote demonstrating our concept to a larger audience. Overall, we took second place.

I was also fortunate to meet and speak with ACM leaders like Loren Terveen, Allison Druin, and my ACM Women Mentor, Liz Gerber. She shares a lot of my design for social good interests, so meeting and speaking with her was inspiring. Overall, I felt welcomed into the ACM community and blown away by the work that is being done in my field.