JooYoung Seo

• Faculty Affiliate, Siebel School of Computing and Data Science
• Faculty Affiliate, Illinois Informatics
• Faculty Affiliate, National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA)
• Faculty Affiliate, Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology
• Faculty Affiliate, Center for Social and Behavioral Science
• Faculty Theme Lead for Digital Access and Equity, Center for Research and Innovation in Technology-Enhanced Learning (ITEL)
• Data Science Educator Affiliate, RStudio
• Affiliate Scientist, Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center (RERC) on Blindness and Low Vision at the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute

Accessible computing/data science, ability design human-computer interaction, inclusive Learning Sciences/STEM+C education across dis/abilities, and accessible health informatics.

• Center for Advanced Study (CAS) Beckman Fellow, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 2026-2027
• Early Career Award, Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), 2023-2026
• Teach Access Faculty Award, 2023
• Teacher Ranked as Excellent, University of Illinois (Spring 2022, Spring 2024, Fall 2024, Spring 2025)
• 2021-2022 Emerging Scholar, International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS)
• Qualcomm Fellowship (2020), ACM Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing Conference
• Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship (2020), College of Education, The Pennsylvania State University
• Cengage Best Doctoral Proposal Fellowship (2019), International Conference on Quantitative Ethnography
• Andrew V. Kozak Memorial Fellowship (2019), The PDK Educational Foundation
• Delta Gamma Golden Anchor Award (2015, 2017), The Pennsylvania State University
• Global Korean Government Scholarship (2014-2016), National Institute for International Education, Korean Government, Seoul, South Korea

JooYoung Seo is an assistant professor in the School of Information Sciences and a faculty affiliate in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science, Informatics Institute, and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Seo is also an RStudio double-certified data science instructor and accessibility expert certified by the International Association of Accessibility Professionals (IAAP). His research topics involve accessible computing, universal design, inclusive data science, and equitable healthcare technologies. As an emerging learning scientist and information scientist, his research focuses particularly on how to make computational literacy more accessible to people with dis/abilities by using multimodal data representation.

He has worked on various research and development projects in accessible computing and open-source data science packages, including gt, shiny, and rmarkdown, and leads maidr (Multimodal Access and Interactive Data Representation) project, an open-source platform that makes statistical visualizations accessible through keyboard navigation, sonification, text descriptions, braille-tactile output, and AI-conversation. His research projects have involved not just web accessibility, but also human-centered design and development studies, including inclusive makerspaces, tangible block-based programming, accessible data science (e.g., data tactualization, sonification, and verbalization), and accessible/reproducible scientific writing tools for people with and without dis/abilities.

His research is funded by national institutes, industrial partners, and academic society, such as Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), National Science Foundation (NSF), National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR), Posit Software, PBC (formerly RStudio), Teach Access, and the International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS) and the Wallace Foundation.

Seo obtained his PhD and M.Ed in learning, design, and technology at the Pennsylvania State University, and double BA in education and English literature from Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul, South Korea.

JooYoung Seo CV

By appointment, please contact professor

For a complete list of publications, visit JooYoung Seo's Google Scholar page.

Evans, D., Naiman, J., Seo, J., & Downie, J. S. (2026). Do you “see” what I “see”? A multi-panel visual question and answer dataset for large language model chart analysis. Proceedings of the 30th International Conference on Theory and Practice of Digital Libraries, TPDL 2026. Communications in Computer and Information Science, Springer. Accepted.

Khan, O., & Seo, J. (2026). QUARTZ: Qualitative understanding via accessible representation and visualization. Proceedings of the 28th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, ASSETS ’26. Accepted.

Khan, O., & Seo, J. (2026). “I don't want my mental health app to give me mental health barriers”: Unpacking the need for digital mental health tracking services with and for the Blind community. Proceedings of the 28th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, ASSETS ’26. Accepted.

Zhang, W., & Seo, J. (2026). Learning Python as a blind programmer in an AI-mediated environment: An autoethnographic study. Proceedings of the 28th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, ASSETS ’26. Accepted.

Pradhan, S. K., Anand, A., & Seo, J. (2026). SK Chess: An accessible chess system for Blind and Low Vision chess players. Proceedings of the 28th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, ASSETS ’26. Accepted.

Zeidieh, A., Sharevski, F., Wang, Y., & Seo, J. (2026). “It's our ride, we're just out of the driver's seat”: Perceptions of and challenges with fully autonomous vehicles among BLV Waymo riders. Proceedings of the 28th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, ASSETS ’26. Accepted.

Choi, S., Seo, J., Krishnan, A., Kamath, S., Hernandez, M., & Kitsiou, S. (2026). Managing physical activity through voice: A usability study of the PCHA app with Blind and Low-Vision individuals. Disability and Rehabilitation: Assistive Technology.

Khan, O., & Seo, J. (2026). “I don't trust any professional research tool”: A re-imagination of knowledge production workflows by, with, and for Blind and Low-Vision researchers. Proceedings of the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Article 1110, 1-24.

Kamath, S. S., Zeidieh, A. N., Potluri, V., O’Modhrain, S., Perry, K., & Seo, J. (2026). Three modalities, two design probes, one prototype, and no vision: Experience-Based co-design of a multi-modal 3D data visualization tool. Proceedings of the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Article 1641, 1-23.

Zeidieh, A. N., & Seo, J. (2025). Check now, can you see it?: Exploring voice and video-capable language models for identifying and spatially locating items of interest for Blind and Low-Vision travelers. Proceedings of the 27th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, 1-5.

Seo, J. (2021, October). Non-Visual Strategies for Making Statistical-Computing Accessible. Lightening talk at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, Champaign, IL.

Seo, J. (2021, September). Accessibility of Science Beyond Content Accessibility. Talk presented at the Argonne National Laboratory (Maths and Computer Science Division): https://www.anl.gov/event/accessibility-of-science-beyond-content-accessibility.

Seo, J. (2021, June). How to Learn to Code. Nature, Webcast: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-01638-z.

Seo, J., & Richard, G. T. (2021, February). Uncovering latent topics of blind people in computer science: structural topic modeling for an email corpus. The International Conference on Quantitative Ethnography (ICQE), Malibu, CA.

Seo, J. (2021, January). Accessible data science beyond visual models. RStudio::global(2021): https://global.rstudio.com/student/page/40617.

Seo, J. (2020, September). Discovering knowledge sharing patterns of blind people pursuing STEM disciplines: data science and computational linguistics on large-scale email corpora. The ACM Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing.

Seo, J., & Richard, G. T. (2020, April). Maker inclusivity = maker accessibility: further interrogations for diverse participation. The American Educational Research Association (AERA), Virtual.

Seo, J., & Richard, G. T. (2018, April). Furthering inclusivity in making: a framework for accessible design of makerspaces for learners with disabilities. The American Educational Research Association (AERA), New York City, NY.

Seo, J. (2017, September). Tactile access to visualized statistical data using R. The ACM Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing, Atlanta, GA.

Liao, J., Patcyk, M., Seo, J., & Hooper, S. (2016, October). Using hierarchical linear modeling to measure growth rate in a gamified CBM environment. The Northeastern Educational Research Association (NERA), Trumbull, CT.