Gene Callahan

A conversation with Industry Associate Professor Eugene Callahan can touch upon such wide-ranging topics as the filming of the Lord of the Rings franchise to personal finance to the importance of making sure no student gets lost in a barrage of rapid-fire technical information.

Callahan, who holds degrees from the London School of Economics and Political Science and from Cardiff University, is an expert in agent-based modeling — a method of simulation in which autonomous entities called agents make decisions individually, rather than collectively, on the basis of a set of rules. (Hence, the Lord of the Rings discussion, since the computer-generated figures in the battle scenes were modeled in that manner, resulting in realistically chaotic action.)

The matter of personal finance arose because prior to his return to academia, Callahan, who has also taught at SUNY Purchase and St. Joseph’s College, worked as a software developer for more than two decades and was a creator of Managing Your Money, one of the first commercially available personal finance programs, which hit the market well before the now-ubiquitous Quicken.

As a member of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Callahan will be teaching a graduate course in algorithms and an undergraduate offering in discrete mathematics. The author of the 2002 volume Economics for Real People, he excels at explaining complex technical topics to a lay audience. “I believe strongly that no student should be left behind during a class, so I make every effort to convey information clearly and concisely,” he says.

Callahan looks forward to being at a major research university and collaborating with his new colleagues. “Everyone thinks that programming is a solitary pursuit,” he explains. “But it’s very useful to be able to run down the hall and bounce ideas off each other.”

Education

• PhD Cardiff University / Prifysgol Caerdydd (2006 — 2011)
• Master of Science (MSc) London School of Economics and Political Science (2004 — 2005)

Companies

• Industry Associate Professor New York University (2017)
• Lead Software Developer Indra's Net (2014)
• Lecturer New York University (2016 — 2017)
• Lecturer St. Joseph's College (2015 — 2017)
• Lecturer SUNY Purchase (2010 — 2015)
• Research Student Cardiff University (2006 — 2011)
• Master of Science The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) (2004 — 2005)
• Partner OTA Limited Partnership (1999 — 2003)
• Author Software Development (1995 — 2003)