Biography
Nimmi (Nirmala) Arunachalam serves as Program Director of the Sprinternship Program at FIU's Knight Foundation School of Computing & Information Sciences (KFSCIS), a partnership with Break Through Tech. She is also the Co-Director of the UKG Academy for Computer Science and Education at KFSCIS. Since establishing the Sprinternship program in 2022 through industry partnerships, she has placed over 300 students in micro-internships with more than 20 employers, with many placements leading to full-time positions.
She is also a doctoral student in Computer Science Education at FIU, where her research examines boundary crossing between academia and industry through computing internships. As an adjunct instructor, she has taught FIU undergraduates how to teach computational thinking to K-12 students, and has designed and facilitated workshops on computational thinking, Intro to AI (Unplugged), and data science for university students, K-12 students, and teachers across South Florida. Before joining FIU, she spent over a decade teaching computer science and engineering at a high school in Palm Beach County, Florida.
Awards & Honors
- Best Research Award, SUCCEED Graduate Program at FIU, 2024
- Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA) Board of Directors, At-Large Representative, 2024
- Co-founder, CSTA Palm Beach/Broward Chapter, 2020
- Excellence in Teaching Award for Computer Science (National), CSTA/Infosys Foundation, 2020
- PLTW National Teacher of the Year for Computer Science, 2018
- NCWIT Aspirations in Computing Educator Award, South Florida Affiliate, 2018
- Career and Technical Education Teacher of the Year, Palm Beach County School District, 2016
- Rotary Teacher of the Year, Olympic Heights High School, 2014
Education
- MEd, Educational Leadership, Florida Atlantic University, 2021
- MBA, Pondicherry Central University, India, 1996
- BE, Birla Institute of Technology, Pilani, India, 1994