I am an Associate Professor at the Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral, in Guayaquil, Ecuador. My work explores technology research and design approaches that can better support groups often pushed to societal margins (e.g., immigrant families, students from underserved backgrounds, and grassroots non-profit communities) to thrive in the way they need and want, rather than following imposed rules, facts or aspirations that are foreign to them.
Specifically, my research centers on 1) understanding the impact that the introduction of novel technologies, from information to data-driven approaches, has on communities traditionally marginalized and 2) examining questions at the intersection of ethics, policies, and development of novel technologies in context often marginalized from technological progress conversations, such as the Global South.
My research sits at the intersection of participatory and assets-based design, community-center approaches in HCI, and critical computing; it contributes to the fields of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW).
I received my Ph.D. in Human-Centered Computing at Georgia Tech, co-advised by Betsy DiSalvo and Neha Kumar and received my Master’s degree in Human-Computer Interaction Design from Indiana University, advised by Shaowen Bardzell. I was a Fulbright Fellow and a Schlumberger Faculty of the Future Fellow.
Please reach out at lvillacr (at) espol (dot) edu (dot) ec.