Amon Millner

Dr. Amon Millner is a Professor of Computing and Innovation at the Olin College of Engineering, where he directs the Extending Access to STEM Empowerment (EASE) Lab. He develops technologies, community programs, and resources to facilitate learners (ages 5 and up) incorporating computing into the way that they play, learn, prepare to fully participate in society, and uplift their communities.

Throughout Dr Millner's career, he has co-created and grown ecosystems that support young learners exploring computing and STEM concepts. He's served as a founding member of the Scratch Programming Language's team, with his work featured as part of the MIT Museum's Scratch exhibit (and his likeness is one of the longest standing selectable sprites). He's also a founding advisor and current Curriculum Developer for the Lyla in the Loop PBS Kids animated series, which has a game that was nominated for a 2024 Children's & Family Emmy(r) for Interactive Media.  

Dr. Millner contributes to national and international frameworks focusing on improving ways that young people navigate developing literacy in realms ranging from reading to data science and from design thinking to ethical computer vision + automated speech recognition. He has worked across continents and cultures as a Fulbright Specialist and has technical patents resulting from work with teen-aged inventors, Silicon-Valley stalwarts, and Ed Tech entrepreneurs. Millner has also been instrumental in shaping blueprints for global innovation and learning communities such as The Clubhouse and Fab Lab networks. He holds degrees from MIT (PhD Media Arts and Sciences), Georgia Tech (MS Human-Computer Interactions) and the University of Southern California (BS Computer Science).