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Last updated on July 4, 2025.

Basics

Name Richard Lee Davis
Label Assistant Professor
Email rldavis@kth.se
Phone +41(0)762205838
Url https://richarddavis.github.io/
Summary A US-born learning scientist, specializing in learning analytics, human-computer interaction, and educational technology.

Education

  • 2013.09 - 2020.09

    Stanford, CA, USA

    PhD in Learning Sciences and Technology Design
    Stanford University
    Dissertation: Opening the Black Box: Investigating the Impact of Engineering Design on Mechanistic Problem Solving and Mechanistic Understanding
  • 2015.09 - 2017.06

    Stanford, CA, USA

    MS in Computer Science
    Stanford University
    Dual-Depth in Artificial Intelligence & Human-Computer Interaction
  • 1999.09 - 2003.06

    Charlottesville, VA, USA

    BA Philosophy, BA Studio Art, Minor Physics
    University of Virginia

Work

Leadership

  • 2022.01 - 2024.08

    Switzerland

    Co-Executive Director
    ETH Zurich - EPFL Joint Doctoral Program in the Learning Sciences (JDPLS)
    • Handled day-to-day academic issues involving the program.
    • Helped plan, organize, and facilitate mandatory PhD seminars for first-year students.
    • Helped plan, organize, and facilitate the JDPLS Winter School.

Awards

  • 2025
    Best Full Paper Nomination & Naomi Miyake Outstanding Student Paper Award
    Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL 2025), Helsinki, Finland
    "Jupyter-Notebook-as-Script": Investigating the Nature and Impact of Implicit Collaboration Scripts in Computational Notebooks
  • 2023
    GLC Research Fellow: AI in Learning
    Global Learning Council
    Recognized for contributions to AI in Learning.
  • 2023
    Best Paper Nomination
    13th International Learning Analytics and Knowledge Conference (LAK)
    "Protected Attributes Tell Us Who, Behavior Tells Us How: A Comparison of Demographic and Behavioral Oversampling for Fair Student Success Modeling"
  • 2020
    Best Paper Award
    13th International Conference on Educational Data Mining (EDM)
    "Variational Item Response Theory: Fast, Accurate, and Expressive"
  • 2016
    Stanford Interdisciplinary Graduate Fellowship (SIGF)
    Stanford University
    Competitive three-year fellowship awarded to outstanding PhD students engaged in interdisciplinary research (2016–2019).
  • 2016
    Best Poster Award
    10th International Conference, EuroHaptics
    "HandsOn: Enabling embodied, creative STEM e-learning with programming-free force feedback"
  • 2015
    Amir Lopatin Fellowship
    Stanford University
    Monetary award supporting gender and computing research via an electronic textiles workshop in an all-girls middle school.
  • 2000
    Echols Scholar
    University of Virginia
    Four-year merit scholarship for exceptional undergraduate students.

Peer review

  • ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI)
  • Journal of Learning Analytics (JLA)
  • International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education (IJAIED)
  • Educational Data Mining (EDM)
  • Educational Technology Research and Development (ETRD)
  • International Conference of the Learning Sciences (ICLS)
  • ACM Interaction Design and Children (IDC) Conference
  • IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies
  • ACM FabLearn: Creativity and Fabrication in Education
  • ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST)
  • Digital Experience in Mathematics Education

Professional service

  • 2025

    Yokohama, Japan

    Associate Chair: Learning, Education, and Families Subcommittee
    ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
  • 2023

    Kristiansand, Norway

    Associate Editor: Digitized Learning and Teaching
    European Conference on Information Systems
  • 2017

    Stanford, CA, USA

    Volunteer Chair
    Interaction Design and Children (IDC) Conference
  • 2016

    Stanford, CA, USA

    Workshop Chair
    Fablearn
  • 2014

    Stanford, CA, USA

    Demo Chair
    Fablearn
  • 2013

    Cambridge, MA, USA

    Demo Chair
    Open Hardware Summit

Research supervised

Doctoral Advising

  • 2022 - Present

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Zhenyu Cai
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Uni Analytics: What, How, and Why Do Different Educational Stakeholders Use Learning Analytics in Higher Education?
  • 2020 - 2022

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Ramtin Yazdanian
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Detecting Latent Training Needs Using Large Datasets
  • 2020 - 2022

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Kevin Gonyop Kim
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Design and evaluation of digital tools to expand experience in vocational education

Graduate Research Project Advising

  • 2024

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Hyeongdon Moon
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Extracting knowledge components of the question using language model
  • 2024

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Zimi Liu
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Harnessing Tiny LLM: Development and User Testing of a RAG-Based Local Agent for Mail Management
  • 2024

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Louis Perrier
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Adaptive posture manipulation to prevent static posture in VR workspace
  • 2023

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Louis Phillipe Perrier
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Programming Reality in VR
  • 2023

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Louca Geroussi
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Augmented Reality Classroom Analytics
  • 2023

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Adrien Buttier
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    A Human-Centred Redesign of Teacher Dashboards for Higher Education
  • 2023

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Yasmine Chaker
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    LLM Agents for Data Understanding
  • 2023

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Leo Litrico
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    A Sketch-Based Interface to Stable Diffusion for Creativity Support
  • 2022

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Nicolas Vial
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Block-based programming in VR
  • 2022

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Brahim Rejeb
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Building the Next Generation of Tangible User Interfaces
  • 2022

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Quang Long Ho Ngo
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Building a Probabilistic Programming Language for Kids
  • 2022

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Eugenie Kwak
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Algorithmic Fairness in University Admissions
  • 2022

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Yahya Hadi
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Data Visualization in Social Robotics Activities for Education
  • 2022

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Ahmed Ezzo
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    TapaCarp VR
  • 2021

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Sorin-Sebastian Mircea
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Web-based platform for quick prototyping of ways to improve the watching experience of sporting events
  • 2021

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Nicolas Kieffer
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Skill extraction from job ads
  • 2021

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Wei Jiang
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Mapping and Exploring Visual Design Spaces with Deep Generative Models
  • 2021

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Nadia Guerraoui
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Data visualisation for sports events
  • 2021

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Guillaume Barre
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    Modeling Skills Dispersion in the Labor Market as a Contagion Process and Predicting Emerging Skills by Monitoring Influential Nodes

Academic consulting

  • 2021 - 2023

    Switzerland

    Consultant
    Platform for Innovative Learning Assessments (PILA)
    OECD
    • Designed and implemented an experimental, interactive computer science assessment for the PILA platform.
    • Piloted the assessment with over 500 students from Singapore, Ireland, the Netherlands, and Brazil.
  • 2019 - 2020

    New York, USA

    Consultant
    FabLearn
    Columbia University
    • Developed and piloted a chat-based inquiry learning tool for students to use during the Covid-19 pandemic.
    • Based on the pilot, the tool received a 100k internal grant from Columbia University.
  • 2022

    Switzerland

    Expert Evaluator
    Mindsteps and Check-dein-Wissen
    Bildungsraum Nordwestschweiz
    • Evaluated the usability, user experience, and pedagogical effectiveness of the summative assessment platform Check-dein-Wissen and the formative assessment platform Mindsteps.
    • Prepared a 10k word report summarizing the findings that was presented to government officials in the Bildungsraum Nordwestschweiz.

University teaching experience

  • 2022 - 2025

    Switzerland

    Instructor
    Theoretical Foundations of the Learning Sciences (LEARN-600)
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) & Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich (ETH Zurich)
    • Co-instructed with Prof. Pierre Dillenbourg and Prof. Manu Kapur.
    • Co-designed curriculum, readings, assignments, and projects.
  • 2020 - 2024

    Lausanne, Switzerland

    Head Teaching Assistant
    Digital Education and Learning Analytics (CS-411)
    École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
    • Assisted Prof. Pierre Dillenbourg.
    • Guest lecturer on topic of Making in Education.
    • Responsible for mentoring student projects and grading reports and exams.
  • 2018

    Stanford, CA, USA

    Instructor
    Beyond Bits and Atoms — Lecture (CS 402, EDUC 236)
    Stanford University
    • Head lecturer.
    • Restructured syllabus and created all new lecture materials.
    • Post-course evaluation: amount learned 5 out of 5, quality of instruction 4.9 out of 5.
    • 20 out of 24 students had their final papers accepted to the Interaction Design and Children conference.
  • 2017

    Stanford, CA, USA

    Instructor
    Beyond Bits and Atoms — Lab (CS 402L, EDUC 211)
    Stanford University
    • Head lecturer.
    • Hired and managed a team of four TAs.
    • Primary designer of course materials.
    • Post-course evaluation: learning quality 4.73 out of 5, instructional effectiveness 4.8 out of 5.
  • 2014 - 2016

    Stanford, CA, USA

    Teaching Assistant
    Beyond Bits and Atoms — Lecture & Lab (CS 402, CS 402L, EDUC 211, EDUC 236)
    Stanford University
    • Assisted Prof. Paulo Blikstein and Bertrand Scheider over two course offerings.
    • Responsible for planning lecture activities and grading student essays.
    • Responsible for planning lab activities, leading sections on Arduino and Processing, and grading student projects.
  • 2013

    Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Teaching Assistant
    Cultures of Making (FNAR 268/568)
    The University of Pennsylvania
    • Assisted Prof. Orkan Telhan.
    • Course covered digital fabrication, printed electronics, and biosynthesis.

Publications