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Next Steps: People of CREATE Updates

June 11, 2025

Congratulations to students and postdocs on a productive academic year! Join us in celebrating these career steps.

Graduation

Anant Mittal, dressed in a blue coat and smiling warmly.

Congratulations to CREATE member Anant Mittal, a newly minted Ph.D., for completing his program and successfully defending his thesis! During his program, Mittal, advised by James Fogarty, worked on the design and development of Jod, a videoconferencing platform to facilitate communication in mixed hearing groups. Mittal’s final thesis is titled, “Designing Feature-Rich Communication and Collaborative Systems in Accessibility and Health.”

Postdocs on the move

Congratulations to these postdoctoral researchers as they embark on the next steps in their careers!

Headshot of Tamanna Motohar. She is wearing glasses and a colorful hijab, smiling at the camera, standing against a plain light gray background

Dr. Tamanna Motahar has been appointed to the position of Patrick Clark Endowed Assistant Professor in the School of Computing and Informatics at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. She expresses deep gratitude to her fellow CREATE postdocs and her mentors, Maya Cakmak, Heather Feldner, and Jennifer Mankoff, for their guidance, mentorship, and support during her postdoctoral fellowship and during the job search.

Kelly Avery Mack, a white, femme-presenting person with curly light brown hair shaved close on one side wearing a green blazer and grey top.

Dr. Kelly Avery Mack, a former CREATE Ph.D. student, will continue with their accessibility research as an Apple AI/ML Resident this summer. Mack told CREATE, “I appreciate the connections with community partners that CREATE fosters and encourages me to be a part of.”

Headshot of Anthony Osuna, smiling warmly at the camera and dressed in a suit and tie. He has short, dark hair and a well-groomed appearance.

Dr. Anthony Osuna is moving on to the position of Assistant Professor in the UW Department of Pediatrics. He’s working on digital safety application for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). One of his aims is to explore how GAI can support safer and more inclusive internet use for people with IDD.

We equally celebrate that Stacy Hsueh, Jazette Johnson, and Bethany M. Sloane will continue as postdoctoral researchers with CREATE. Emma J. McDonnell will also continue as a participating CREATE postdoc, with a primary appointment in UW Medicine as a National Library of Medicine Postdoctoral Fellow in Biomedical Informatics and Medical Education.