Professor Sheila McIlraith is the recipient of a 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award from the CAIAC.
Professor Sheila McIlraith has received a 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Canadian Artificial Intelligence Association (CAIAC) in recognition of her research contributions to knowledge representation and reasoning, automated planning and machine learning.
McIlraith received her PhD from the University of Toronto in 1997. Prior to joining the faculty at U of T in 2004, McIlraith spent six years as a research scientist at Stanford University and one year as a postdoctoral fellow and visiting scientist, jointly at Stanford and Xerox PARC.
A fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), McIlraith has published more than 150 papers in premier international peer-reviewed venues. Her early work was foundational to the development of semantic web services, catalyzing an area of research, and influencing development of World Wide Web standards.
At the University of Toronto, McIlraith’s research has been focused on reasoning about dynamical systems, and in particular sequential decision making, often through the lens of human-compatible AI. Over the years, her work has found application in a diversity of problems ranging from the diagnosis and control of electromechanical systems — from photocopiers to robotic and space systems, to the automated synthesis of web services that are optimized for personal preferences.
McIlraith is also committed to studying the impact of AI on society, currently serving as an associate director of the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society, with a research focus on AI safety. She is also a faculty member of the Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence and a Canada CIFAR AI Chair.
In 2020, McIlraith initiated and co-developed the Embedded Ethics Education Initiative (E3I), which teaches students how to incorporate ethical considerations into the design and deployment of technology. The high impact teaching and learning venture embeds paired ethics-technology education modules into a set of computer science courses across all four years of the undergraduate curriculum.
Praised by students as a passionate teacher and supervisor, McIlraith has mentored several generations of students who have made significant contributions to the theory and practice of automated planning and reinforcement learning.
Her research group’s contributions include algorithms for automated symbolic planning and reinforcement learning with Linear Temporal Logic and automata-based objective specifications, state-of-the-art non-deterministic (FOND) planning systems, and an epistemic planner, with applications that range from reactive synthesis to theory of mind reasoning.
As CAIAC’s highest honour, the Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes individuals who have distinguished themselves through outstanding research excellence in artificial intelligence over the course of their more than 25-year academic career. McIlraith is the second woman to receive this award since its establishment in 2008.
“It’s a tremendous honour to receive this award,” said McIlraith. “I share this recognition with my many wonderful students and collaborators who I have worked with over the years.”
“I congratulate Sheila on this well-deserved recognition,” said Eyal de Lara, professor and chair of the Department of Computer Science. “She is a dedicated and passionate scholar whose leading research on safe and human-compatible AI systems is resonating here at U of T and in the broader computer science community.”
Past recipients of the CAIAC Lifetime Achievement Award from the Department of Computer Science include the late Professor Fahiem Bacchus, University Professor Emeritus Geoffrey Hinton, Professor Emeritus Graeme Hirst, Professor Emeritus Hector Levesque, Professor Emeritus John Mylopoulos and Professor Richard Zemel.