Computer Science Student Awarded NSF Graduate Research Fellowship

What you need to know: This U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship program is among the most prestigious honors possible for students pursuing research-based master’s and doctoral degrees in STEM fields around the U.S.

Why this year is significant for UCF: From the 13,000 graduates who applied for the fellowship nationwide, the NSF awarded only 1,500 (about one in nine). Those honorees receive financial support for advanced education and a stipend for their research. Six of them are UCF alums who are now set up to advance research in the areas of interest they discovered as undergraduates.

If you only remember one item: The NSF considers these six graduates among our nation’s next high-achieving scientists and engineers. Alejandro Aparcedo Gonzalez ’24, a computer science alumnus, was among the six who were awarded the fellowship.

Alejandro Aparcedo Gonzalez ’24

Computer science alum and computer vision graduate student

He’s working on his master’s in computer vision at UCF, with an eye on “advancing video understanding with multimodal artificial intelligence (AI).” In short, Gonzalez sees into the future.

Research Interest: In professional terms, I’m finding ways for computer vision to improve human understanding of the real world. In practical terms, the end goal is to give humans time for leisure activities. The way I see it, that’s essentially the goal of AI research.

Research Inspiration: My parents owned a computer shop when I was a kid, so I’ve always been comfortable with technology. Turns out, my parents (like a lot of people) still had a lot to learn. Now they use AI in their own work, and I see how it leaves them more time to engage in other activities.

For Example: With the perfect video understanding model, we could make a device to help blind people to navigate the world by asking the device questions, like, “Is it safe to cross the street?” Using AI, the device would understand the visual context of traffic, obstacles, and pedestrian signals, and give reliable guidance.

How UCF Provided a Path: I was introduced to this field in the Center for Research in Computer Vision, the same place where I learned about the fellowship. I’m now the first person in my family to pursue a Ph.D.

Career Vision: I’d like to work in a top AI lab and then transition into academia — or maybe the other way around.