Richard Antonio Aló

Developed and implemented MS/PhD Data Science curricula with various AI/ML concentrations.

Acquired $5M Hewlett Foundation grant to create Cyber Policy Institute with diverse faculty and graduate student fellows.

Co-PI US DoC NTIA/Connecting Minority Communities $5.35M grant with the responsibility of grant objective, 'Building Big Data University K-20' ($1.8M)

Conducted cross-campus workshops on Data Science, AI, and ML, supporting students with Jupyter Notebooks.

Connected faculty and students to National Research Platform, National Data Platform, National AI Research Resources, leveraging resources like cloud and exascale computing.

Spearheading AI infused curricula development for FAMU Development Research School K-20 curricula.

Fostered interdisciplinary collaborations across departments and institutions to enhance research initiatives.

Mentored undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, and junior faculty in research projects.

• Collaborated with colleagues across departments or universities on joint research projects.
• Coordinated activities among different teams working on interdisciplinary projects.
• Conducted research on educational theories and practices for diverse student populations.
• Collaborated with faculty to implement best practices in teaching and learning.
• Secured external funding through grants and partnerships to support ongoing research activities.
• Advocated for student needs through active participation in university committees.
• Prepared and delivered presentations on subject-specific topics.

• Three Associate Deans, four coordinators, four directors, five academic departments [elected chairs], five Centers, 88 faculty, 25 staff, $10M E&G budget, $15 M external awards, 1100 majors, Degrees [16 BS, 5 MS, 1 Ph.D. Awaiting Approvals for 2 Ph.D. 1 MS,1 BS developed and submitted to Academic Affairs].
• $5M Hewlett Foundation award to create Cyber Policy Institute: a collaboration between the College of Social Sciences, Arts and Humanities and my Data Science/AI/ML Research/Learning Cluster, Faculty and Graduate Student Fellows from each entity to investigate needed policy, ethics, management, law issues per AI/ML Big Data investigations.
• Data Science/AI/ML Research/Learning Cluster: Initiated in 2019 with me and two Big Data Science Post Docs, now has five Data Scientists and seven domain specialists.
• Cyberinfrastructure/Broadband Capability: I pursued grants and partnerships to provide FAMU 32 GPUs, Research/Learning DMZ, 100G broadband capabilities, direct connectivity to the NSF National Research Platform [providing unlimited shared resources (cloud, data, exascale computing, modules created by 55+members, 1300+ GPUs) for underserved/underresourced institutions] and its Nautilus Cognitive Computing Ecosystem.
• Student Success Initiatives: FL Performance Based Funding Award: I created a Student Success Initiatives [SSI] Director and several SSIs[ for retention [90% returning to second year] and persistence to four-year [increased to 39%] and six-year graduation rates increased to 56%]

• Two Associate Deans, five coordinators, nine academic departments [appointed chairs], 2500 majors [1900 undergraduates], 115 faculty, 40 staff, five centers, NIH Research Consortium for Minority Institutions Data Center [[for i8 participating institutions] $12M E&G budget
• Increased external awards from $11M to $35M/ year.
• Major Funds Raised- grants, foundations, MS State Legislature $9 million for 25,000 sq. ft. new wing to four-year-old Engineering Building; $25M for JSU Foundation by achieving 10% diversity in College enrollment
• spearheaded and implemented ten new degree programs: PhD Engineering, PhD and MS Data Science & Engineering, BS EE, MS in Statistics, STEM MBA and M Business Intelligence [both a collaboration with College of Business dean], BS programs in Engineering Technology. Bio-Medical Engineering, Electrical Engineering
• Recruited and hired two department heads, recruited and trained academic faculty by first bringing them on board as Researchers in our $11M NIH RCMI Grant and then transitioning them to negotiated faculty lines.
• Implemented initiatives to drive curriculum quality and target learning outcomes by obtaining a $10M US Dept. of Education $10M First in the World grant.

• Lead Program Officer for $10M Presidential Awards for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring [PAESMEM] in direct liaison with The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy [OSTP] presented three teams of 18 individuals to the US President.
• Co-lead, Robert Noyce Teacher Training Program- a $55M bipartisan congressionally mandated program.
• Under direction of OSTP, I was team member creating the solicitation for Computational and Data-Enabled Science and Engineering, which is the foundation for Big Data Science and Engineering [AI/ML]
• Received the NSF Director's Award for Collaborative Integration [worked with Offices of Cyber Infrastructure and International Sciences and Engineering and the Directorates of Computer and Information Sciences and Engineering, Mathematical and Physical Sciences and Education and Human Resources.
• Provided ongoing direction and leadership for program operations with three solicitations in Division of Undergraduate Education.
• Scheduled and supervised staff meetings to discuss new ideas and update participants on program details and milestones.

• Chairman, Department of Computer and Mathematical Sciences (1982-1995). Three Associate Chairs, two directors, 600 majors [1900 undergraduates], 60 faculty, two staff, E&G budget $2M [=$6.8M in 2024].
• With a faculty committee, I led the development of BS degrees in Computer Science and Statistics.
• With scholarship grants from NSF and US Navy Research Office, I created a Scholars Academy. [total of $10M}
• Designated as Hispanic Serving Institution and Minority Serving Institution
• Awarded an 'Interactive Math Text Project Site' [one of six nationwide] to develop Active Learning. $2M [funded jointly by Mathematics Association of America, The National Science Foundation and IBM]
• Worked with dean to assess and evaluate courses and programs in appropriate discipline.
• Instituted Peer Led Team Learning that engaged Socratic Methods of teaching/mentoring, encouraged class discussions by building discussions into lessons, actively soliciting input, asking open-ended questions and using techniques to track student participation and improved grades.

• Developed BS/MS degrees in Computer Science, BS in Statistics.
• Appointed to Coordinating Board of Texas Higher Education to review secondary school teacher certification.

• Taught graduate and undergraduate topology, numerical analysis, finite element methods, functional analysis, and computer programming courses.
• Responsible for undergraduate Computer Science program.
• Acquired Scaife Foundation grants for four summers; three NSF summer research grants.
• 1969-70 Appointed by C-MU as Consultant to Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur to develop the engineering curriculum and PhD program in Computing, graduated their first two PhDs.