Congratulations to the 2025 Research and Teaching Excellence Awardees
Each year, the Department of Computer Science at Boston University gathers to recognize exceptional achievements among its doctoral students in the areas of research and teaching.
On Monday, May 6th, Director of Graduate Studies Professor Marco Gabordi announced this year’s recipients of the departmental awards. Satchit Sivakumar, Hao Yu, and Aneesh Raman were honored with the Department of Computer Science Excellence in Research award, recognizing their outstanding scholarly contributions. Karan Vombatkere, Zichen Zhu, and Tarikul Islam Papon received the Department of Computer Science Excellence in Teaching award for their dedication and impact in the classroom.
Additionally, Piotr Teterwak was recognized with the Award for Excellence in Teaching by the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences, acknowledging his significant contributions throughout the academic year.
Congratulations to all of our awardees for their hard work, commitment, and excellence in advancing the mission of BU CS.
2025 Department of Computer Science Research Excellence Awardees
Satchit Sivakumar researches the foundational aspects of data privacy and its interplay with algorithm design, machine learning, and reproducible science. His notable contributions include introducing differentially private sampling from distributions, establishing tight bounds for the dataset size required for this task across various distribution families . He has also explored the relationship between differential privacy and the replicability of data-driven algorithms, demonstrating that replicability is statistically equivalent to other notions of algorithmic stability, such as differential privacy and perfect generalization . Additionally, Satchit has studied differentially private algorithms in the continual release model, providing strong lower bounds on the error of continual release mechanisms and formulating a model that accounts for adaptively selected inputs . His work on instance-optimal geospatial data histograms has further advanced the understanding of algorithmic efficiency in spatial data analysis. Beyond his research, Satchit has been an active member of the theory group and the Computer Science department, taking a leading role in organizing seminars and reading groups, coordinating social activities, and serving on the department’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) committee, thereby fostering a collaborative and inclusive academic environment.
Hao Yu researches computing systems that involve face images, with an emphasis on fairness, representation, and expressive modeling. His contributions include curating a large-scale dataset primarily composed of faces from Black individuals, demonstrating its effectiveness in reducing bias and improving the fairness of both generative and discriminative face models. He also developed a novel framework for generating expressive cartoon avatars from realistic faces produced by text-to-image diffusion models, introducing a richly annotated cartoon avatar dataset characterized by fine-grained facial expressions, unique identities, and balanced distributions across age, gender, and race. In another line of work, Hao curated datasets capturing student interactions and proposed a video-based affect transfer learning approach to predict student performance on exercises, advancing educational applications of computer vision. Beyond his research, Hao has been an active member of the Image and Video Computing and AI groups at Boston University, and has served as a teaching fellow for five computer science courses, including as head teaching fellow for the computer vision course.
Aneesh Raman researches adaptive data systems, particularly in the realm of indexing and data structures. One of his significant contributions is the design of a family of indexes capable of ingesting data more efficiently as the ingestion order approaches sortedness—a common pattern in real-world data. This innovation includes a mechanism that predicts which node will likely receive the next entry while minimizing lock contention in highly concurrent scenarios. Aneesh has also demonstrated exceptional mentorship skills, serving as a mentor to both undergraduate and graduate students. He eagerly explores new research directions and assumes pivotal roles within his team. Additionally, he has played an instrumental role in fostering and maintaining research collaborations with other groups, furthering the impact of his work.
2025 Department of Computer Science Teaching Excellence Awardees
Karan Vombatkere has demonstrated exceptional leadership and dedication as the lead Teaching Fellow for CS 132: Geometric Algorithms at Boston University during the Spring 2024 and 2025 semesters. In Spring 2024, he proactively developed comprehensive teaching materials for each discussion section, reviewing lecture content, creating detailed discussion outlines, and formulating sample problems that greatly enhanced student engagement and understanding. Beyond his organizational contributions, Karan exhibited a deep commitment to student success by providing insightful feedback on midterm and final exams, and mentoring newer course staff to improve tutoring effectiveness. His outstanding contributions to teaching excellence make him a deserving candidate for the department’s Teaching Excellence Award.
Zichen Zhu and Tarikul Islam Papon co-instructed CS561: Data Systems Architectures at Boston University in Spring 2024, delivering an exceptional course that integrated cutting-edge research with practical application. They meticulously updated lecture content, developed comprehensive teaching materials, and guided students through research-intensive projects, far exceeding the typical responsibilities of teaching fellows. Their engaging lectures and hands-on approach received outstanding evaluations from students, reflecting their dedication and expertise. Their remarkable contributions to the course in Spring 2024 merit formal recognition for their exemplary efforts.
2025 Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Teaching Excellence Awardee
Piotr Teterwak was recognized for his exceptional performance as a Teaching Fellow in Fall 2024 for CS 542, co-taught by Professors Kate Saenko and Stan Sclaroff. Piotr consistently went above and beyond his formal responsibilities, demonstrating both a deep commitment to student learning and a strong capacity for managing course operations at scale. In his role, Piotr led weekly lab sessions with clarity and enthusiasm, ensuring that lab content was well-aligned with lecture materials and presented in an engaging and accessible way. He worked closely with students during and beyond scheduled office hours—often guiding them through complex mathematical derivations—to ensure they thoroughly understood the course concepts. On the logistical side, Piotr played a key role in coordinating graders for this large-enrollment course. He personally reviewed grading for consistency and fairness, ensured timely feedback, and implemented systems to streamline exam distribution and grading. He also proactively identified students who were struggling and facilitated timely intervention to support their academic progress. His thoughtful, student-centered approach and dedication to excellence in teaching and course management made him a clear choice for this award.