
Academic Panels & Workshops Deputy Chair
Raja Kushalnagar
Assistant Professor
Gallaudet University
Raja Kushalnagar is the Director of the Information Technology program in the Department of Science, Technology and Mathematics at Gallaudet University in Washington, DC.
His research interests encompass the fields of accessible computing and accessibility/intellectual property law, with the goal of improving information access for people with sensory disabilities. In the accessible computing field, he investigates information and communication access disparities for people with sensory disabilities. For example, he investigates how technology can aid access to multimodal communication or information through speech-to-text, i.e., captions or subtitles, and sign language interpreters. In the legal field, he advocates for laws and policies for access and inclusion for people with sensory disabilities, such as automatic captions or audio description.
He also serves on organization board committees that focus on the inclusion of persons with disabilities in computing fields, including the Computing Research Association – Widening Participation, Teach Access and Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction.
He has mentored 91 plus undergraduates and 8 graduate students. He has received over $4 million in grants and has published over 50 peer-reviewed publications. He can be reached at raja.kushalnagar@gallaudet.edu