Joseph E. Beck

Joseph E. Beck

Computer Science Department

Amherst, MA 01003

beck@cs.umass.edu

Lab: Center for Knowledge Communication
Location: CS Building, Room 224, Cubicle #1
Work phone: (413) 545-0582
Fax: (413) 545-1249
Home phone: (413) 665-0165

Ok, you've brought up my home page, I'm curious why, but you've probably just wandered in off the CKC page. I've recently finished my Ph.D. on applying machine learning to user modeling. This work was on creating a computational model of a population of students who have work on an intelligent tutor, and then using this model to train a reinforcement learning agent whose goal is to derive a desired teaching policy. I have a list of my publications on-line in (mostly) postscript format, as well as my resume.

I've headed off to CMU to work as a post doc on project LISTEN, which is a reading tutor that teaches kids to read by listening to them. I'm continuing my work on applying machine learning to decision making of intelligent teaching systems. I don't have email or a webpage there yet.

I'm also working towards a doctorate in education, specializing in instructional technology (with some background in psychometrics). This was "paused" while I finished my CS degree, and I am taking a leave of absence for now.

I finished teaching CMPSCI 187. It's time-consuming, but was fun. I chaired a workshop this summer at ITS2000 on applying machine learning techniques to intelligent tutor construction.

Misc info