Jennifer Tour Chayes, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, was named recipient of the ACM Distinguished Service Award for her effective leadership, mentorship, and dedication to diversity during her distinguished career of computer science research, teaching, and institution building.
Chayes’ service to the computing community is broad and sustained, encompassing leadership at both Microsoft Research and the University of California, Berkeley; service to many computing organizations; expanding the diversity of the computing field through mentorship of women, underrepresented racial minorities and other disadvantaged groups; and making important research contributions.
Chayes’ distinguished service includes founding and leading the Theory Group at Microsoft Research and the Microsoft Research New England and New York City Labs. She also had an important role in the development of Microsoft’s Montreal lab.
The MSR labs that Chayes founded had three times the percentage of women compared to corporate labs, and an unusually high percentage of people of color and members of the LGBTQ community. She has mentored more than 100 women in her career, many of whom have gone on to become leaders in their fields. Chayes continues to emphasize diversity as a core value at Berkeley in her position as Associate Provost of the Division of Computing, Data Science, and Society, and Dean of the School of Information.
Additionally, Chayes has an exceptionally strong record of service at the national and international levels to the computing community. Her service includes participation in advisory boards and committees associated with the National Academy of Sciences, the National Research Council, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and numerous other organizations. She has served on the Turing Award committee and the Heidelberg Laureate Selection Committee. She has served as an Associate Editor for many leading journals in statistical physics, computer science, mathematics, and data science, and has served as a co-organizer of numerous conferences across these fields.
