Austin Toombs

I didn't get a picture of the best sign I saw today, but I remember what it said:

Somewhere in America
A little Hispanic girl
Is hiding in an attic
And keeping a diary.

#NoKings

I don’t know what’s normal. I think, according to PCS, I did 41 reviews over the last 12 months. It’s hard to know for sure.

Happy first day of the 2025-26 school year! (I didn’t teach yesterday so today counts)

Since I'll be an AC, you don't have to worry about spoiling your potential reviewer pool

Academic friends prepping for the CHI deadline: I am happy to give some big-picture pre-review feedback if you could use it! I can probably do this for three-ish papers (maybe two papers where I would be considered an expert of some kind and one paper on a topic I'd just be an everyday reader)

Trump has tried quite a few things to try to distract us, but none of them are working. Some things he should try next, which could totally work: universal healthcare, pro-earth climate change policies, federal decriminalization + legalization of certain substances, prison reform… I’d be distracted!

Me three months ago:

Thankful for my co-authors, Paul Parsons, Colin Gray (@graydesign.bsky.social), Jenny El-Shamy, and Anastasia Ostrowski <3

The Ambiguity Amoeba and other Metaphors: Teaching Students to Sketch and Prototype Through Uncertainty | Proceedings of the 7th Annual Symposium on HCI Education

Our #educhi2025 papers are available now! Also, the conference has just started (today is the pedagogy workshop educhi2025.educhi.org). I'm excited about my paper, which is about using amoeba drawings to encourage sketching and prototyping within ambiguous problem spaces dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/...

You can tell I turned 37 today because I watched a full ad about a nonstick pan, followed the link to the website, and got really excited to read about how it works because I’m tired of my eggs sticking. I bought it. When it comes it will be like my birthday all over again!

Have a wild idea? A messy problem? Or just something you’ve been meaning to get to?

Let’s see if our students can help. Reach out anytime!

Examples:
- Students generated design ideas for consolidating and improving a chatbot ecosystem.
- A local candle company reimagined their e-commerce experience, allowing customers to shop based on scent profiles.

3. You’re seeking design inspiration.
Sometimes, all you need is a fresh perspective. Students can help explore “what if” scenarios and provide design concepts to spark new directions.

Examples:
- A language learning researcher worked with students to turn study findings into an educational game about making sushi and learning Japanese.
- Multiple companies worked with student teams to streamline clunky internal dashboards that had evolved without coordinated design oversight.

2. You’ve got back-burner projects that need attention.

Our students can help you push forward those “nice-to-have” projects that never make it to the top of your list.

Examples:
- A startup drone company working with fire departments partnered with our students to explore interface designs to help drone operators collaborate with first responders.
- Students helped a travel company explore how influencers and content creators could help drive customer engagement.

1. You’re facing a UX challenge, but don’t know where to start.

Maybe you’ve spotted an opportunity to improve the user experience of a product or service, but aren’t sure how to move forward. Our students can help reframe the problem, design interventions, and clarify tradeoffs between solutions.

Wondering if your team could work with our HCI/d students? In this thread I'll list some project types that have worked well in past semesters to spark ideas.

Let’s all remember that our conferences are attended by people who speak many languages. Your presentation is a chance to explain your research as clearly as possible. It is not the time to try to show off your vocabulary, which is likely inaccessible to many in the room.

a woman says maybe this is a nightmare nope , can 't fly away . this is real life . ALT: a woman says maybe this is a nightmare nope , can 't fly away . this is real life .

Heyyyyy, so when we pick destinations with low flight connectivity for our conferences, any kind of travel delay snowballs. All the Newark stuff from last night has me getting to the conference 36 hours later than planned. I’ll be missing the workshop I was going to be a full day early for. #DIS2025

I know I’m a bit biased, since @graydesign.bsky.social is an author, but I’m legitimately excited to read this. I’m talking myself out of bringing it to DIS with me, but I’m going to try to tackle this before EduCHI. studioproperties.org #studioProperties #studioPedagogy #prettyBooks

Don’t tell the republicans, but I used part of my sick day to turn this Totally Straight* SuperDry tank top into a SuperGay one.

*I don’t get all the credit. Tank tops are already pretty gay. It didn’t take much convincing.

What. A. Nerd.

Project types and sponsor involvement is flexible. If you have some research or design back-burner problems at work that could use a push, those tend to make great projects! Feel free to reach out with any questions #hci #ux #interactiondesign #design #experientiallearning #hcieducation

I’m teaching the “HCI/d Studio Practice” course next semester. We pair industry partners with student groups that include first and second year Master’s HCI/d students. If you know someone interested in working with a group of students next semester, let me know! More details: lnkd.in/gqUshj6C

When a person becomes a billionaire, every cent over 1B should go to a world fund. Not for the specific nation, but for the Earth. They literally can't spend that much money anyway. #voteAustinForEmperor

Graphs showing 25 years of budgets for the National Institute of Health, NASA, and the NSF. In all cases, the proposed budget for next year is far, far below any year of the previous quarter century.

There are 2 previous historical cases of countries destroying their science and universities, crippling them for decades: Lysenkoism in the USSR and Nazi Germany. The Trump administration will be the 3rd.
It's not just budgets but research, institutions, expertise, and training the next generation.