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Avni Kothari

I'm a recent Master's graduate in Computer Science at UC San Diego (on the job market!) where I was named a DeepMind Fellow. I did research with Berk Ustun and Lily Weng in algorithimc recourse. I am broadly interested in trustworthy machine learning, and more specifically in algorithmic fairness, algorithmic recourse, and data privacy. Previously, I was a software engineer creating web-applications in education and healthcare. Before that, I received my Bachelors in Mathematics and and Economics from UT Austin. Outside of school you can usually find me biking or enjoying the outdoors in San Diego.

My CV can be found here.

Don't hestiate to reach out if you want to learn more about me or my work!

News

  • May 2023

    Our paper Prediction without Preclusion: Recourse Verification with Reachable Sets is coming soon!

  • June 2022

    I am beginning research with Dr. Berk Ustun and Dr. Lily Weng on recourse

  • Aug 2021

    I started my Master's at UCSD

  • Feb 2021

    I am named as one of the DeepMind Fellows for 2021

Publications

  • Prediction without Preclusion: Recourse Verification with Reachable Sets

    Avni Kothari, Bogdan Kulynych, Lily Weng, and Berk Ustun

    In Submission, 2023

    Individuals can be assigned predictions that they cannot change through actions on their features. This paper investigates and formalizes scenarios of predictions without recourse. We argue the importance of these scenarios for both model development and recourse detection methods.

Industry Experience

  • Jan 2020 – May 2021

    Edovo, Software Engineer - Chicago, IL

    Designed and developed an educational content platform to handle 700K+ requests per day

    Created a pipeline and nightly job to merge 4 billion rows of user event data in PostgreSQL

    Spearheaded team sessions to improve software development practices and adopt new frameworks

  • Aug 2017 – March 2019

    8th Light, Lead Software Engineer - Chicago, IL

    Developed a diabetes management iOS app to connect patients with diabetic nurse specialists

    Enhanced a Java-based continuous deployment pipeline, seamlessly integrating with internal tools

    Mentored peers and residents through pair programming sessions and code reviews

Teaching Experience

  • Fall 2022

    TA for DSC 291 - Interpretability and Explainability in Machine Learning

  • May 2011 – August 2013

    Differential Calculus Tutor

Service

  • PenPal for the Incarcerated (September 2020 – Present)
  • Warren Community Garden (August 2021 – Present)
  • The Recyclery (August 2018 – May 2021)