N.C. A&T’s Smith-Jackson Receives IEOM Society International Diversity Award

EAST GREENSBORO, N.C. (Sept. 18, 2020) – North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University Senior Vice Provost for Academic Affairs Tonya Smith-Jackson has received the 2020 Diversity and Inclusion Award from the Industrial Engineering and Operations Management (IEOM) Society International.

Smith-Jackson was honored with the award during the recent fifth North American IEOM Conference, held virtually from Detroit.

The IEOM Award Committee selected Smith-Jackson for the honor in recognition and appreciation of her achievements, contributions, dedication and lifelong achievement in the industrial engineering and operations management profession, said IEOM Society International Executive Director Ahad Ali, Ph.D.

Earlier this year, Smith-Jackson was one of 17 people Gov. Roy Cooper appointed to the North Carolina Department of Commerce’s Board of Science, Technology and Innovation. A&T is the only historically black college or university represented on the board.

In 2018, Smith-Jackson served at the National Science Foundation for a year as program director of the Computer and Information Science and Engineering Directorate in the Cyber-Human Systems Program before returning to A&T in the role of interim director for the Center of Excellence in Cybersecurity, Research, Education and Outreach.

After working briefly in the private sector, Smith-Jackson joined the faculty of Virginia Tech in 1999. Fourteen years later, she joined A&T as professor and chair of the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, founded the Human Factors Analytics Laboratory and later founded and co-directed the Cyber-Human Analytics Research for the Internet of Things (IoT) Laboratory.

Smith-Jackson has long demonstrated a commitment to diversity and inclusion, having served as president of community-based organizations focused on social justice for women and people of color. She served as an EEO Federal Women’s Program Manager in Germany, as a multicultural fellow at Virginia Tech, and received faculty awards for advancing women and for advocacy for accessibility rights throughout her career. Today she serves as chair of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee of the Institute for Industrial and Systems Engineers.

A Fellow of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Smith-Jackson’s research focuses on cyber-human systems, cognitive ergonomics, fairness and inclusion in data science, and mixed data modeling to develop systems that empower caregivers, older people and those with disabilities; provide support for security and privacy; and protect the nation’s cyber infrastructure.

Smith-Jackson earned her B.A. in psychology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and her M.S. in interdisciplinary psychology/ergonomics and industrial engineering and Ph.D. in psychology/ergonomics from North Carolina State University.