Outstanding Leaders Under 40 Dr. Naja A. Mack

Dr. Naja A. Mack was born in Sumter, South Carolina, and is the fifth child of Buster and Margie Ballard-Mack. She graduated from Sumter High School in Sumter District 17 in 2006.

Mack pursued her higher education at Claflin University in Orangeburg, South Carolina. During her time there, she was a member of the Alice Carson Tisdale Honors College and graduated Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science in Computer Engineering.

Subsequently, Mack continued her academic journey at Clemson University, where she achieved a Master of Science in Computer Science with a concentration in Interactive Computing in Fall 2013. Her significant accomplishment during this period was the successful defense of her dissertation, "ICon History: An Intelligent Conversational History Tutor," which led to the creation of the first social studies intelligent tutoring system. This system enables upper elementary students to engage in natural language conversations with virtual African American historical figures from the past.

Following her doctoral studies, Mack assumed the role of a Computing Innovation Postdoctoral Fellow at Morehouse College. Her research endeavors were dedicated to enhancing the attitudes, awareness, motivation, and participation of African American at-risk youth in computing. She achieved this by developing and evaluating the effectiveness of a coding boot camp prep course.

In April 2021, Mack earned her Ph.D. in HumanCentered Computing under the guidance of Dr. Juan E. Gilbert from the Computer and Information Science Engineering Department at the University of Florida's Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering.

Mack recently accepted a tenure-track assistant professor of computer science position at Morgan State University, where she will also be a National Science Foundation (NSF) VISION Fellow.