Professor of Computer Sciences: Understanding Strengths and Limitations of AI

Job Summary:

The Department of Computer Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has embarked on a multi-year effort to grow its faculty, enhance its strengths in many areas of computing, and extend its impact in interdisciplinary areas. As part of this endeavor, and as part of the department's involvement in the Wisconsin Research, Innovation and Scholarly Excellence (RISE) Initiative at UW-Madison, we invite highly qualified candidates with expertise in understanding the strengths and limitations of AI to apply to a position at the assistant, associate, or full professor levels that will begin in August 2025. The successful candidate will advance the educational mission of the College of Letters & Science, that values, prioritizes, and actualizes evidence-based and student-centered teaching and (undergraduate student) mentoring. They will contribute to an environment that fosters engagement and a sense of belonging for faculty, staff, students and members of the broader community.

Responsibilities:

Duties will include scholarly research in one or more area(s) of computer science associated with AI, especially research on experimental and theoretical techniques to analyze the performance of neural networks, with the goal of understanding the strengths and limits of AI systems in more rigorous, theory-driven ways; individual and classroom teaching in computer science at the undergraduate and graduate levels and advising and mentoring graduate students majoring in computer science or related areas; service to the department, college, university, and academic community, nationally or internationally. The successful candidate will participate in interdisciplinary and collaborative efforts with other departments, schools and colleges.

Institutional Statement on Diversity:

Diversity is a source of strength, creativity, and innovation for UW-Madison. We value the contributions of each person and respect the profound ways their identity, culture, background, experience, status, abilities, and opinion enrich the university community. We commit ourselves to the pursuit of excellence in teaching, research, outreach, and diversity as inextricably linked goals.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison fulfills its public mission by creating a welcoming and inclusive community for people from every background - people who as students, faculty, and staff serve Wisconsin and the world.

For more information on diversity and inclusion on campus, please visit: Diversity and Inclusion

Education:

Required
Applicants must have a Ph.D. in Computer Science or in a closely related area prior to start of appointment.

Qualifications:

Successful candidates will show potential for developing an outstanding scholarly research program in one or more area(s) of computer science and for innovative and for student-centered teaching in computer science at all levels. The successful candidate will demonstrate experience with fostering or the ability to foster a teaching, learning, mentoring, departmental, and research environment where all can thrive.

Work Type:

Full Time: 100%

This position may require some work to be performed in-person, onsite, at a designated campus work location. Some work may be performed remotely, at an offsite, non-campus work location.

Appointment Type, Duration:

Ongoing/Renewable

Anticipated Begin Date:

AUGUST 18, 2025

Salary:

Negotiable
ACADEMIC (9 months)

Additional Information:

The Department of Computer Sciences is among the oldest and top-ranked computer science departments in the world, renowned for its groundbreaking research in computer architecture, database systems, distributed and grid computing, programming languages, optimization, and many other areas of computer science. The department has a strong track record of support of transformative research and building large-scale computing infrastructures, such as HTCondor and CloudLab, and of new interdisciplinary collaborations, programs, and centers, including the Wisconsin Institutes of Discovery (WID). The department has also been the beneficiary of significant donations aimed at supporting its research and educational mission.

The School of Computer, Data & Information Sciences (CDIS) is a significant resource for the Department of Computer Sciences to strengthen its interdisciplinary and cross-campus research collaborations, to establish new, innovative educational programs in the intersection of computing and other domains, and to promote engagement with high-impact, real-world challenges that can be addressed through computing. More information about CDIS can be found at https://cdis.wisc.edu. Construction is proceeding on a new building for CDIS, which will be the ne