EECS History

Special Observances

Black History Month (February)
Women’s History Month (March)
Latinx Heritage Month (mid-September to mid-October)

All Articles about EECS Culture and History

Berkeley EECS to honor Joseph Gier with memorial sculpture December 21, 2022 - A community is defined by the heroes it chooses to celebrate. We invite you to join the EECS department in recognizing a previously overlooked hero, Berkeley EE Prof. Joseph T. Gier, the University of California's first tenured Black professor. Raised in Oakland by a single mother, Gier came to Berkeley as an undergraduate in 1930,… More

Lee Julian Purnell (1896-1983), Berkeley’s earliest known Black EE student February 21, 2022 - Lee Julian Purnell is the first Black student known to have graduated from the EECS department. He was born in Washington, D.C. in 1896, graduated from Berkeley High in 1915, earned a B.A. from Cal in 1919, a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from MIT in 1921, and an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Berkeley in… More

Graduate Spotlight: Xinyun Chen March 8, 2021 - We are thrilled to spotlight Xinyun Chen, an EECS PhD student under Professor Dawn Song. We had the opportunity to interview her about her research and advice for undergraduate students. Here's what she had to say! Tell us about your research? My research lies at the intersection of deep learning, programming languages, and security. Specifically,… More

Welcome to EECS Women’s History Month! March 8, 2021 - Happy March and welcome to Berkeley EECS Women's History Month (EECS WHM)! EECS WHM is a celebration held during Women’s History Month to recognize women, both past and present, in the fields of electrical engineering (EE) and computer science (CS). The goal of EECS WHM is to facilitate the conversation about diversity and inclusion in the field through a series of newsletter articles and… More

Women in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering: A Network of Our Own September 1, 2020 - Since the late 1970s, WICSE has pursued the goal of increasing the number of women in those disciplines and supporting their academic progress. WICSE has become a permanent force in EECS, and, indeed, is the first such group in an American university with a disciplinary focus on computer science or electrical engineering. Since then, women’s… More

Latinx Heritage Month: Prof. Dan Garcia October 4, 2019 - I grew up as a “Nuyorican” kid in the Woodlawn Reservoir neighborhood of The Bronx. My dad's parents were from the Eastern side of Puerto Rico (Ceiba and Fajardo), and both came over in the great Puerto Rican migration to NYC in the 1930s. My Abuela saw the Hindenburg fly overhead! My dad was born… More

Latinx Heritage Month: Prof. Armando Fox September 27, 2019 - I was born and raised in New York City.  Both my parents are from Cuba and fled as political refugees after the Castro government took power. At that time, professionals were simply not allowed to leave the country, but my parents couldn't live in an unfree society, so they applied for and were awarded one-year… More

Latinx Heritage Month: Prof. Emeritus Edward Ashford Lee September 25, 2019 - I was born and grew up in Santurce, a region of San Juan, Puerto Rico. My mom was from Kentucky, my dad from Puerto Rico. My dad was a descendant of some notable Puerto Ricans, particularly the poet and playwright Alejandro Tapia y Rivera, after whom a theater in San Juan is named, Bailey K.… More

A Salute to Early Women in STEM at UC Berkeley March 22, 2019 - During the first hundred years at UC Berkeley women students and faculty were minimally present in science and engineering. By 1870, in its second year, the Faculty Senate proposed to the Regents the admission of women “on equal basis with men.” The Regents voted unanimously and next year Berkeley opened the door to eight women… More

2019 EECS WHM Events February 28, 2019 - WHM Kickoff Event - Succulents and Breakfast 3/1; Research Talks 3/7; JewelrEE Making Social 3/7; Movie Screening - Hidden Figures 3/8; Ice Cream Social 3/13; Lunch and Learn 3/19, Speaker Panel - Women in EECS 3/20 More

Berkeley EECS Women’s History Month (WHM) Kickoff Event February 26, 2019 - Come join Google, the Berkeley EECS Department, and the Association of Women in EECS (AWE) at the Berkeley EECS Women's History Month Kickoff Event! The event will include breakfast, and you can take home your very own succulent! Event Details: Wozniak Lounge, 9:30am - 11:45am on Friday, March 1st. Professor Tsu-Jae King Liu, College of… More

Reintroducing Joseph Thomas Gier February 22, 2019 - Joseph T. Gier was a pioneer in every sense. He was the first Black tenured faculty member in the UC system, a successful inventor, and a world authority on infrared measurement. Who was Berkeley EECS Prof. Joseph Gier? More

The 2019 EECS Distinguished Alumni February 8, 2019 - Berkeley EECS has established a Distinguished Alumni Award to recognize the valuable contributions of its most distinguished alumni. EE alumnus Sharad Malik (M.S. '87/EE Ph.D '90, advisor: Robert k. Brayton), currently chair of Electrical Engineering at Princeton, was recognized for excellence in teaching, and groundbreaking research on design methodologies for future computing systems. EE alumnus… More

Portraits by Lotfi Zadeh February 27, 2018 - At the beginning of his career, Prof. Lotfi Zadeh enjoyed capturing the people around him in a series of black and white portraits. He joined the EECS faculty in 1959 after stints at Columbia and Princeton.  As department Chair from 1963-68, he led the charge to change the name of the department from Electrical Engineering… More

The 2018 Distinguished EECS Alumni February 8, 2018 - The 2018 Distinguished EECS Alumni awards were presented to Prof. Marie desJardins, Prof. Andrea Goldsmith, Richard Ruby, and EECS Prof. Emeritus Eric Brewer, at the at the Berkeley EECS Annual Research Symposium (BEARS) on February 8, 2018. CS alumna Marie desJardins (Ph.D. '92), currently a Professor of Computer Science & Electrical Engineering, and Associate Dean… More

Fall ’17 Alumni Spotlight: Estela Llinás August 20, 2017 - 40 years ago, Estela Llinás (née Soria) graduated from Berkeley with a Ph.D. in EECS.  One of an elite group of women during her era, she looks back on her childhood, her experiences as a woman engineer, her role as a mother, and a career that spanned three continents. Dr. Llinás was born in Córdoba,… More

2016: A Year of Firsts January 3, 2017 - While 2015 ended on a high note with the late-November announcement of Ali Javey’s team’s creation of the first optoelectronically perfect monolayer semiconductor, that was just a taste of things to come.  Research conducted in the EECS department in 2016 would go on to produce no fewer than four new firsts in a variety of arenas:… More