After twenty years of developing software, I returned to school to pursue a Master of Science in Computer Science. I'm currently a graduate student at the University of Toronto in the Department of Computer Science. My first year and a half of research was with Graeme Hirst in the area of Computational Linguistics. I then spent two years, doing research for Bell University Labs in the area of Requirements Engineering, under the supervision of Steve Easterbrook. I returned to Computational Linguistics, writing up the results of my original research — the automatic identification of idioms within text — for my thesis. Both Suzanne Stevenson and Graeme Hirst were my supervisors for this effort.

Throughout my studies, I worked part-time either as a teaching assistant (TA) or a lecturer. In addition to routine TA jobs, I have worked as head-TA, and automarker TA — creating and running test programs (for Java & C++) to facilitate assignment marking. I've taught at U of T for over three years. Teaching takes up more time than I expected it would — but it can be very rewarding.

Finally ... I have finished, graduated and have returned to the workforce where I plan to remain forever. I have been fortunate to get a job at Google and work in the Kirkland, Washington office. I love everything about my job. Ultimately ... returning to school has been a worthwhile venture and an adventure.

Contact

Faye Baron

University of Toronto,

Department of Computer Science
10 King's College Road
Room 4301
Toronto Ontario
M5S 3G4
CANADA