Brian C. Dickinson

Education
I completed a double major in Computer Science and Business Administration with a minor in Mathematics at Houghton University (then Houghton College) in 2015. From there I attended the University of Rochester in Rochester, NY, where I was advised by Henry Kautz. I completed my M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Science at the University of Rochester in 2018 and 2020, respectively.

What are the main focuses of your research?
Much of my early research focused on classification and clustering problems in social media. My Ph.D. research was partially funded by Google and pivoted into geographic and spatial analysis – predicting satellite data and clustering cities based on movement patterns gleaned from location data collected anonymously from Android phones. My current research primarily focuses on edge cases in machine translation that are primarily relevant for uncommonly spoken or written languages. These projects are designed to support the needs of SIL International, most notably in efforts to produce viable initial draft translations of the Old Testament in languages where there is very little existing written text – often only the New Testament.

Professional Experience
I worked for four years as a student intern with the networking group within technology services at Houghton College. There I gained a lot of hands-on experience running copper and fiber optic cables, configuring managed network switches and access points, developing internal web applications, and assisting with deep packet inspection.

What specific courses or specialties do you teach?
The best label I can give to the bundle of courses I teach at Grove City College is “Big Picture.” I tend to be well organized and enjoy the challenge of courses that need to pull together many distinct ideas while still painting a coherent picture where every piece obviously has its place. My Introduction to Computer Science, Advanced Programming, and Web Development courses all follow this pattern. Some of my other courses such as 2D Game Design and Development and Problem Seminar might better be thought of as a “just for fun” category despite the serious importance of their contents for students’ growth and learning.

In your opinion, what is the most important piece of advice you give your students to help them succeed?
Manage your time well; it is your most valuable resource. Computer science students begin hearing this from me in the new student orientation session and they hear it again in each class they take with me. I go out of my way to ensure that students know exactly what assignments will be expected of them, when they will have learned enough to get started, and when each assignment will be due at the beginning of the semester to provide students the opportunity to practice managing their own time well.

Selected Publications

• (2021) Hugo Barbosa et. al. “Uncovering the socioeconomic facets of human mobility”, Sci Rep 11, 8616 (2021) DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-87407-4
• (2020) Brian Dickinson et. al, “Inferring Nighttime Satellite Imagery from Human Mobility”, Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence. 34, 2020, 394-402. DOI: 10.1609/aaai.v34i01.5375
• (2019) Aleix Bassolas et. al. “Hierarchical organization of urban mobility and its connection with city livability”, Nat Commun 10, 4817 2019. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-12809-y
• (2014) Zachary Miller et. al, “Twitter Spammer Detection using Data Stream Clustering”, Information Sciences, 2014, 260, 64-73. DOI: 10.1016/j.ins.2013.11.016
• (2013) Brian Dickinson, Benjamin Valyou, Wei Hu, “A Genetic Algorithm for Identifying Overlapping Communities in Social Networks Using an Optimized Search Space”, Social Networking, 2013, 2, 193-201. DOI: 10.4236/sn.2013.24019

Staff/Faculty Image
Lastname	Dickinson
Title	Associate Professor of Computer Science
Grove City College Alumni
Office Phone Number	724-458‐2603
Email Address	DickinsonBC@gcc.edu