Student Leader, Hannah Murray
Meet Hannah Murray, a second-year Ph.D. student in the Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science at USC with a passion for applying AI to wildlife conservation. Inspired by her work during her master’s program at Georgia Tech, Hannah’s research focuses on understanding and protecting species like her favorite animal, the pangolin. Beyond her academic pursuits, Hannah enjoys pottery and exploring Los Angeles. As a CAIS student leader, Hannah plays a role in organizing events that bring together students, faculty, and community members to advance AI for social good. Get to know more about Hannah and her journey!
What are some of your highlights at USC?
Some of my favorite parts about being at USC are meeting new people, exploring Los Angeles, and taking advantage of all the events on USC’s diverse campus. I attended an engineering school for my BS and MS, so I feel lucky to see students excelling in more creative disciplines!
Tell us about why you decided to get involved in CAIS and your experience as a student leader.
I was drawn to USC particularly because of the existence of CAIS and the faculty that are a part of it. I’m primarily interested in application-driven research, so CAIS was a perfect fit since so much of the work done in the lab works with different community leaders and experts. This is my first semester serving as a student leader, so I am grateful for the opportunity to help organize the many great events that CAIS hosts every year!
Icebreaker questions:
List your favorite book, TV show, or movie.
My favorite movie is Midnight in Paris. The opening sequence showcases different clips of Paris with Sidney Bechet’s performance of “Si tu vous ma mere” playing. It’s the best intro to a movie I’ve ever seen and makes me wish I was in Paris everytime!
What would the title of your autobiography be?
This is the hardest question on here! My cop-out answer is that I hope I remain so open-minded to future opportunities that I can’t even imagine where my life will take me in the future to write a representative autobiography 🙂
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever been given?
If it won’t matter to you in a month, don’t spend another second worrying about it. As students, it can be easy to fall into a perfectionist mindset. This piece of advice I was given reminds me that sometimes “good enough” is just fine.
What is your favorite item you’ve bought this year?
I’m getting married in 2025, so I would say my wedding dress!
If you had to delete all but 3 apps from your smartphone, which ones would you keep?
Assuming the ones that come standard on a smartphone are still available, the first I would keep is ClayLab. This app helps me keep track of all the pottery pieces I’ve made at the studio. The next would be Duolingo, primarily because I’m almost at a 1000-day streak of practicing French and I’m determined to reach the milestone. The last would be my journal app, which I’m trying to get into the habit of writing in daily.
If you had to eat one meal everyday for the rest of your life what would it be?
As we enter fall, I’ve been making a lot more soup at home. My favorite so far has been lemon and orzo soup. I could eat that multiple days in a row.
What would be the most surprising scientific discovery imaginable?
Hard to give one answer to this question. Perhaps if artificial superintelligence was achieved in the near future.
If you could live anywhere in the world for a year, where would it be?
I dream of living in a place with good public transit. New York City, London, and Singapore are all places I’ve dreamed about at one point or another.
Last, but not least, why should students join CAIS?
If you are interested in getting experience working on impact-driven projects and collaborating with people from all sorts of disciplines both in and outside of USC, CAIS is the perfect place for you.
