Daniela Damian


CAPI/ECS Chair in Inclusive Science, Technology and Engineering

In 2023 Dr. Daniela Damian was named UVIC ECS-CAPI Chair for Inclusive Science, Technology and Engineering, with a mission is to create pathways for women and other underrepresented minorities to study and succeed in STEM, as well as to create a supportive network that leverages industry and academic mentorship and relationships for UVic students. 

 

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Dr. Daniela Damian is a Professor of Software Engineering in University of Victoria’s Department of Computer Science. She grew up in Romania, where she graduated with a BSc degree in Informatics from the University of Babes-Bolyai in 1995. After obtaining her MSc (1997) and PhD (2001) degrees in Software Engineering at the University of Calgary, she conducted her NSERC-funded postdoc research in an ethnographic study of software practice at Unisys in Australia and in collaboration with University of Technology, Sydney. At the University of Victoria, she has been a Research Associate and Senior Research Fellow at CAPI since 2018 and 2020 respectively, and the 2021 Special Advisor to the Dean on Inclusive Science and Engineering in the Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science. In 2021 Daniela founded the INSPIRE:STEM for Social Impact Program hosted in the Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science and CAPI, in collaboration with the Faculty of Science. Supported by a consortium of regional and national industry partners, the program engages students from University of Victoria as well as Asia in community-driven, sustainability-focused experiential projects to develop skills, connections, and a supporting network for the underrepresented talent in Science, Technology and Engineering. Daniela received the 2019 Royal Society New Zealand Catalyst: International Leader Award, and held Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Auckland in New Zealand in 2020 and the Singapore Management University in 2023. She is a registered Professional Engineer.

Together with her students in the SEGAL Lab (Software Engineering Global interAction Lab), Daniela’s scholarly work studies human and collaborative aspects of software engineering, global software engineering, requirements engineering, diversity and inclusion in software teams, and software education. In 2006 she was one of the founding members and the first Program Chair of the IEEE International Conference on Global Software Engineering, served as Program co-Chair of the first Conference on Software Engineering in Society, and Program Co-Chair and Steering Committee member of the premier IEEE Conference on Software Engineering. She has served roles on the Editorial and Advisory boards of the top ranked Journals in Software Engineering. She received the 2020 Provost’s REACH Award for Excellence in Experiential Teaching and the 2019 Faculty of Engineering Teaching Award.