Bailey Flanigan (she/her)

I'm a fifth-year PhD student in the CMU Computer Science Department. I have the pleasure of being advised by Ariel Procaccia. I am funded by a Fannie and John Hertz Fellowship, an NSF GRFP, and a Siebel Scholarship.

I am on the academic job market this fall, applying for tenure-track faculty jobs at CS, OR, and interdisciplinary programs. You can find my CV here.

Paul Gölz, Ariel Procaccia, and I wrote an essay, published through the Harvard Ash Center, about considerations for designing the randomness in sortition: Mini-Public Selection: Ask What Randomness Can Do For You.

I have a few new working papers up:

• Manipulation-robust citizens' assembly selection studies how to reduce incentives for people to try to increase their chances of being chosen for the assembly by misreporting their features. As we expand upon in the Discussion of this paper, our problem is also potentially of interest to the strategic classification literature.

• The distortion of public-spirited participatory budgeting studies the welfare of participatory budgeting outcomes in a beyond-worst-case model of voter behavior: instead of considering only their own interests, voters also weigh the interests of others. This model is motivated by the potential for this behavior to be cultivated in practice, via democratic deliberation.

I also recently posted significantly updated versions of two working papers, with new results: Toward accounting for stakes in voting and Smoothed analysis of social choice, revisited. 

Research. I do computer science research motivated by the goal of making democratic processes more equitable and more effective — two goals I believe are, in many contexts, one in the same. I usually work with theoretical models and tools from social choice, AGT, and algorithms, but I work hard to make sure my work incorporates input from practitioners and research from other disciplines, especially political science. 

Before coming to CMU, I did my BS in biomedical engineering at UW-Madison, where I primarily researched cancer biology. Afterwards, I spent a few years doing research in economics (Yale), computer science (Drexel), and public health (Philani Nonprofit in South Africa). 

Teaching. Within and outside of research, I am passionate about inclusive teaching and mentoring. During my PhD, I led the CS-JEDI project, which entailed the creation of CMU's introductory DEI course for first-year PhD students. Its curriculum is open-sourced and designed to be adaptable to new settings. For details, see the CS-JEDI Project page. For additional resources (some related to teaching and mentoring), see the Resources page. 

Funding. I am funded by a Fannie and John Hertz Foundation Fellowship and an NSF GRFP.

I enjoy communicating my work and talking with students who want to learn more about computer science research, DEI education, etc. Please don't hesitate to reach out!

e-mail bflaniga at andrew dot cmu dot edu 

office 6002 Gates-Hillman Center (CMU) 

         5.449 Science and Engineering Complex (Harvard)

links google scholar, dblp, CV