Honors and Awards Governor's Cup 3rd Place, Nevada Dynamics (2015, Faculty Advisor) Sontag Competition Winner, Nevada Dynamics (2015, Faculty Advisor) USC Computer Science Department Best Dissertation award (2012) National Science Foundation CRA-CCC Computing Innovation Fellowship (2011-2013), awarded to 20 Ph.D. graduates in the United States USC Order of Areté (2011) International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence Doctoral Consortium Travel award (2011) USC Robotics Lab George Bekey Service award (2010) Human Robot Interaction (HRI) Student Travel award (2010) Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) Spring Symposia Travel award (2009) USC Body Computing Conference, Outstanding Presentation (2008) National Science Foundation (NSF) Human-Robot Interaction Pioneers Workshop Travel award (2007,2008) IEEE International Symposium in Robot and Human Interactive Communication (RO-MAN) Best Poster Presentation award (2007) USC Mellon award for Excellence in Mentoring (2007) Coleman Institute Conference Travel award (2006) USC Annenberg School of Communication Digital Media Fellow (2005) Winner, Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) Robot Host Competition (2002) Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) Student travel award (2002) University of Rochester Rush-Rhees Fellow (1999-2003) University of Rochester Meliora Scholar (1999-2003)