June Ahn

Biography

June Ahn, Ph.D., is Professor in the School of Education and, by courtesy, the Department of Informatics at the University of California, Irvine, where he also serves as Senior Associate Dean. His research sits at the intersection of Learning Sciences, Information Sciences, Education Leadership, and Human-Computer Interaction, with a focus on how the co-design of new technologies and education systems can enhance learning in schools, local communities, and online environments. He approaches this work through research-practice partnerships, improvement science, and design-based research, with the aim of promoting equitable learning experiences and outcomes for diverse learners.

Ahn founded and directed the Orange County Educational Advancement Network (OCEAN), a research-practice partnership center at UCI that facilitated over 50 research projects and supported faculty in raising nearly $20 million in extramural funding during his tenure. He has raised over $26 million in total research funding and philanthropy across his career, with support from the National Science Foundation, the Institute of Education Sciences, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, and other major funders. In 2024, the Carnegie Corporation of New York recognized his research-practice partnership with the Anaheim Union High School District as one of ten exemplary examples of community partnerships, with a particular focus on collaborative work in artificial intelligence. He previously served as Director of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab at the University of Maryland, College Park—the oldest HCI research center in the United States—and has held faculty positions at New York University and the University of Maryland prior to joining UCI.

Ahn has served on national advisory bodies including the U.S. Department of Education committee that authored the National Educational Technology Plan and a visioning panel for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). He has served as Co-Editor of Educational Researcher and holds editorial board positions at Cognition & Instruction and the Journal of Information and Learning Sciences. As of 2025, his scholarship includes 85 peer-reviewed articles and has accumulated over 5,300 citations with an h-index of 37. Ahn received his Ph.D. in Urban Education Policy from the University of Southern California.

Education

• PhD in Urban Education Policy, University of Southern California, 2010
• MA in Computing and Education, Columbia University, 2006
• BA in Computing in Education, Brown University, 2003

Distinctions

• Profiles in Collective Leadership, Carnegie Corporation of New York, 2024
• Chancellor's Faculty Award for Undergraduate Mentorship, UCI Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP), 2023
• HASTAC Scholar Award, 2010