Adam Purtee

  Assistant Professor of Instruction
  Computer Science Department
  Rochester, NY 14627-0226

  Email: apurtee@cs.rochester.edu
  Office: 2109 Wegmans Hall


About Me

I am a member of the instructional faculty in the Computer Science department at the University of Rochester. I generally teach 2-3 courses per semester ranging from a very large introductory course to upper level electives on machine learning and computer networks. Before teaching at this university, I was a lecturer at the Rochester Institute of Technology, where I developed a passion for teaching and working with students. I generally structure my courses around programming projects and other hands-on activities where students are able to immediately see the proof of their own understanding of the material. I try to present a classroom environment that is inclusive, welcoming, and accessible, while still providing a challenging and engaging experience for most students.

Want to take CSC 171 in the Fall?

Several students have emailed me asking about 171 this Fall. We reserve a large majority of the seats in this course for first semester CS students. have it set to a low cap to allow a some non-majors to add the course. Once all the CS majors have enrolled (likely August) we will increase the course cap. This course is offered every semester and in the summers. In short, if you are a non-major you should consider taking CSC 171 in the Spring or Summer terms. Otherwise, please check back again in august for available seats. We typically have enough room for everyone who wants to take the course, but this depends on availability of rooms, workshop leaders, and TAs. If you are considering switching to a CS major for the Fall term, please try to follow the above process. Once you are in touch with your faculty advisor we will most likely be able to find a spot for you. If you are a DSC student, please also try to follow the above process. Data science students typically take CSC 171 in the spring semesters. In summary, please be patient and most likely we will find seats for most students who want to take the course. Unfortunately our software (URStudent) does not support waitlists or nuanced seat reservations, hence this effort to explain the process.

Current Courses - Spring 2022


Recent Courses


Research Interests

My research interests have been primarily directed at improving the scope and flexibility of symbolic reasoning methods applied in connection with natural language. In conjunction with my advisor Len Schubert, I wrote a pattern transduction tool for working with parse trees, explored semi-supervised methods for training statistical parsers, and developed an inferentially coherent modal embedding for probabilistic knowledge in first order (and higher order) logics. As an instructional track professor, my teaching responsibilities now claim the majority of my time; however, I remain interested in the development of human-level artificially intelligent machines. Relevant publications are presented below:


Notes to My Students