Alumni and Friends Making an Impact

Senior Mykaella Romain spent her 2024 summer break phishing. But instead of setting her sights on carp or walleye, she was after criminals.

“I went to work to prove how artificial intelligence could be used to create bad emails and websites and how the technology could be used harmfully if in the hands of the wrong people,” said Romain. 

For Romain, the path that led her to study phishing scams started when she decided to follow her family into health care. Born in Brooklyn to Haitian parents, Romain grew up in Columbus, Ohio, and originally decided to study nursing at UD.

But after nearly completing her nursing degree, Romain — now a computer information systems major — had to admit to herself that she had a different calling.

“I realized my ultimate goal is to be a developer, building apps and websites,” said Romain.

After meeting with her professors, Romain realized she only needed an extra semester to make it happen.

She was awarded the Kathy Tamer Endowment Award for Computer Science, which allowed her to keep studying at UD, and thanks to funding from the College of Arts and Sciences Dean’s Fund for Excellence and the One Day, One Dayton supporters who give to it, she was able to handle the costs of her summer phishing project.

“The scholarship helped cover tuition, allowing me to focus on my research, instead of bills.” — Mykaella Romain

“The scholarship helped cover tuition, allowing me to focus on my research, instead of bills,” said Romain. “You also need a subscription to use Open AI, so the Dean’s Fund helped pay for that.”

Together with Zhongmei Yao, associate professor of computer science and director of research for the Center for Cybersecurity and Data Intelligence, Romain got to work using Open AI to prove that if someone were to give an application program like ChatGPT enough information, it could produce believable enough emails to scam people out of money or personal information.

“Experiential learning opportunities like this are important,” said Romain. “I couldn’t do hands-on coding like this in class because you’re focused on so many topics at one time.”

Romain graduated in December, and her winding journey to her diploma has left her with advice for future Flyers.

“Take advantage of everything on campus,” said Romain. “Put yourself out there. Find clubs and organizations where you can get involved. Don’t be afraid to start over.”