{"id":1425,"date":"2025-05-22T23:26:14","date_gmt":"2025-05-22T23:26:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2025\/05\/22\/ford-school-sttp-program-hosts-webinar-to-discuss-the-intersection-of-technology-and-society\/"},"modified":"2025-05-22T23:26:18","modified_gmt":"2025-05-22T23:26:18","slug":"ford-school-sttp-program-hosts-webinar-to-discuss-the-intersection-of-technology-and-society","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2025\/05\/22\/ford-school-sttp-program-hosts-webinar-to-discuss-the-intersection-of-technology-and-society\/","title":{"rendered":"Ford School STTP program hosts webinar to discuss the intersection of technology and society"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>The University of Michigan\u2019s<a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/\"> Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program<\/a> at the Ford School of Public Policy held a panel discussion Tuesday afternoon about the importance of technical experts working with civil society organizations to serve the public. The webinar, titled \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/fordschool.umich.edu\/event\/2025\/making-technology-work-everyone-empowering-civil-society-and-technologists-work-together\">Making Technology Work For Everyone: Empowering Civil Society and Technologists to Work Together to Shape our Future<\/a>,\u201d was hosted by Shobita Parthasarathy, Public Policy professor and STPP program director, as well as STPP managing director Molly Kleinman.<\/p>\n<p>Parthasarathy began the webinar with an overview of the STPP program, which provides educational initiatives for students interested in learning how science and technology relate to policy, politics and public interest. Some of STPP\u2019s offerings include various<a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/education-training\/undergraduate-opportunities\"> undergraduate opportunities<\/a> like the <a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/people\/student-research-corps\">Student Research Corps<\/a> and the<a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/community-partnerships-initiative\"> Community Partnerships Initiative<\/a>. Parthasarathy said one goal of the program is to help political organizations better understand the workings and implications of growing technologies such as artificial intelligence.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA wide range of welfare services are now automated or using AI technologies, and so it\u2019s increasingly important for our large infrastructure of social service organizations, civil society organizations and governments to have deep understanding, not just of the technical details, but also of the implications of those technologies,\u201d Parthasarathy said. \u201cMuch of what we do at STPP is provide training to help (these groups) engage in those conversations.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>After Parthasarathy spoke, Kleinman described additional examples of STPP research, such as their<a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/sites\/stpp\/files\/2025-04\/stem-in-society--2025-final.pdf\"> Broadening Horizons report<\/a>,<a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/sites\/stpp\/files\/2024-09\/michigan-municipal-league-AI.pdf\"> Artificial Intelligence Handbook for Local Government<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/sites\/stpp\/files\/2024-01\/community-partnerships-playbook-2024.pdf\"> and Community Partnerships Playbook<\/a>. Kleinman said the program\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/community-partnerships-initiative\">Community Partnerships Initiative<\/a> is designed to incorporate community insight and feedback into this work by <a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/community-partnerships-initiative\/horizon-scanning\">identifying <\/a>emerging technologies that may pose challenges to STPP <a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/community-partnerships-initiative\/community-partners\">community partners<\/a>.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-1    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cOften we know that the people most likely to be harmed or left behind by technological advancement are the people who are least likely to be in the room designing those technologies, making decisions about those technologies,\u201d Kleinman said. \u201cSo the goal of the Community Partnerships Initiative is to facilitate bringing that expertise into those rooms and supporting community organizations engaging in these topics the way that they want to.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rackham student Divya Ramesh, STPP <a href=\"https:\/\/fordschool.umich.edu\/stpp\">graduate certificate program<\/a> member, told the panel her interest in policy grew after working at a startup that built computer vision technology aiming to help those with visual impairments. Ramesh said the increased use of artificial intelligence within the company made her consider how to best incorporate community voices into that work.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOften, there\u2019s a huge distance between the technologists who build the solutions and the communities that we claim we would like to benefit,\u201d Ramesh said. \u201cFor me, it\u2019s about building (the) grid differently, starting to bring the communities into the room, exploring processes by which we can bring both technologists and community experts on the same page, and then start to envision technologies differently.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>During the panel, U-M alum Annabella Vidrio discussed her experience with the Community Partnerships Initiative, such as writing a<a href=\"https:\/\/stpp.fordschool.umich.edu\/sites\/stpp\/files\/2024-03\/tenant-screening-2024.pdf\"> memo<\/a> with<a href=\"https:\/\/detroitaction.org\"> Detroit Action about<\/a> the dangers of tenant screening algorithms and working with <a href=\"https:\/\/wethepeoplemi.org\">We The People Michigan<\/a> to <a href=\"https:\/\/wethepeoplemi.org\">write <\/a>contracts between the <a href=\"https:\/\/detroitmi.gov\/departments\/police-department\">Detroit Police Department<\/a> and surveillance technology companies. Vidrio said this work increased her awareness of the intersection between community needs and technology.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn both these instances, the technology, I realized, was not made with the community well-being in mind, and in doing so had negative consequences,\u201d Vidrio said. \u201cSo in doing this work with the Community Partners Initiative, I really learned the importance of a humanities-driven tech perspective, and how we can use this to empower communities rather than to impede them.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-2    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>U-M alum Trevor Odelberg told the panel he appreciated the STPP program for giving him the opportunity to engage in large-scale policy conversations despite majoring in electrical engineering. Odelberg said he now applies his understanding of both the technical and social aspects of technology in his current role as a U.S. congressional fellow sponsored by the <a href=\"https:\/\/ieeeusa.org\/\">Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s relatively easy to find experts in the sciences, it\u2019s relatively easy to find experts in policy,\u201d Odelberg said. \u201cIt\u2019s very, very hard to find people who can speak both those languages and can bridge that nuance. So I can just really say that this skill set is really valued, at least in Washington, and we need a lot more people like this as well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Daily Staff Reporter Aanya Panyadahundi can be reached at <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/news\/government\/ford-school-sttp-program-hosts-webinar-to-discuss-the-intersection-of-technology-and-society\/mailto:aanyatp@umich.edu\"><em>aanyatp@umich.edu<\/em><\/a><em>.<\/em><\/p>\n<aside>\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p><h3 class=\"jp-relatedposts-headline\"><em>Related articles<\/em><\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The University of Michigan\u2019s Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program at the Ford School of Public Policy held a panel discussion Tuesday afternoon about the importance of technical experts working with civil society organizations to serve the public. The webinar, titled \u201cMaking Technology Work For Everyone: Empowering Civil Society and Technologists to Work Together to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1426,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[283,774,325,1584,1582,775,1585,1581,1251,1583],"class_list":{"0":"post-1425","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-discuss","9":"tag-ford","10":"tag-hosts","11":"tag-intersection","12":"tag-program","13":"tag-school","14":"tag-society","15":"tag-sttp","16":"tag-technology","17":"tag-webinar"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1425"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1427,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1425\/revisions\/1427"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}