Ignite Connecting Technologies & Communities: Understanding and Facilitating Community-Based Technology Innovation

August 1-3, 2018 | College Park, Maryland

Smart and connected communities hold the promise of improved safety, health, sustainability, and economic development. Realizing this promise depends upon investment in smart and connected community infrastructures, but no matter how much is spent on technical infrastructures the benefits ultimately depend on local innovation. While we have created high-capacity network infrastructures, open data resources, and civic application development platforms, much of what technologists know about facilitating community-based innovation has arisen from practice-based learning rather than building on the work of researchers who study the factors, structures, and processes that underlie community-based innovation.

The NSF-funded Ignite Connecting Technologies & Communities (ICTC) workshop bridges these two communities to identify what is known, what has been done, and what additional work is needed to strengthen our ability to explain, facilitate, and enable community-based technology innovation. The workshop will develop a research agenda and foster initial collaborations through case-presentations; brainstorming and agenda articulation exercises; and networking opportunities. The focus is on practitioners and researchers who explore the factors, conditions, and practices that enable communities to leverage emerging data resources and infrastructure technologies to meet local needs. The original CFP can be found here.

∗ Organizers: Brian Butler, Susan Winter, Mary Anne Kendig, Myeong Lee, & Diane Travis

∗ For addition information contact us (ignite2018ischool@gmail.com). Check back often as further information will be added.