NYU's Alliance for Public Interest Technology is examining the role that existing and newly developed technologies are playing in serving the public throughout the coronavirus pandemic.
Coordinated by NYU Vice Provost Charlton McIlwain, Michael Weinberg of the School of Law's Engelberg Center for Innovation Law & Policy, and Tandon professor Mona Sloane, the project will inventory all technology-based efforts to address the COVID-19 crisis by higher education institutions, the public sector, the private sector, and the news media across the United States. Its work will evaluate these efforts, assess their outcomes, and make recommendations for what we can do to prepare for future pandemics.
Among the project's studies will be a consideration of the value of face shields and what may be learned from the design and implementation of this technology.
In times of global crisis, it's important to consider the ways that technologies might be inequitably distributed to help some and deny that help to others.”
Charlton McIlwain
The Alliance will also be collecting and using data to understand the racial and economic disparities in COVID-19 treatment and evaluating machine-learning models that were designed to predict community spread.
"In times of global crisis, it is import to consider the ways that technologies might be inequitably distributed to help some and deny that help to others,” McIlwain said. “It’s important that in our rush to solve one devastating problem, we don’t create or exacerbate others."
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