INFO 6600- Technology and Underserved Communities

  • Instructor: Prof. Nicki Dell, Bloomberg 263, Office hours by appointment
  • Course communication: Email me to be added to the course Slack team
  • Lectures: Tuesday / Thursday, 1:15-2:30pm, Bloomberg 497 / Gates 206
  • Grading: Reading responses (30%), in-class critiques and activities (20%), participation in discussions (15%), project (35%)
Class schedule

Devices in Class

We will use smartphones and laptops to facilitate hands-on activities and work in class. However, research and student feedback clearly shows that using devices on non-class related activities harms my teaching, your own learning, and other students' learning as well. Therefore, I only allow device usage during activities that require devices. At all other times, you should put your device away. I'll help you remember this by announcing when to bring devices out and when to put them away.

Academic Integrity

Each student in this course is expected to abide by the Cornell University Code of Academic Integrity. Any work submitted by a student in this course for academic credit will be the student's own work. You are encouraged to study together and to discuss information and concepts covered in class with other students. You can give "consulting" help to or receive "consulting" help from such students. However, this permissible cooperation should never involve one student having possession of a copy of all or part of work done by someone else, in the form of an e-mail, an e-mail attachment file, a soft copy, or a hard copy. If you have questions about what is, or is not, permissable, please come and ask.

Students with Disabilities

Your access in this course is important. Please give me your Student Disability Services (SDS) accommodation letter early in the semester so that we have adequate time to arrange your approved academic accommodations. If you need an immediate accommodation for equal access, please speak with me after class or send an email/slack message to me and/or SDS at sds_cu@cornell.edu. If the need arises for additional accommodations during the semester, please contact SDS. You may also feel free to speak with Student Services at Cornell Tech who will connect you with the university SDS office.

Reading Responses

Reading and discussion are major components of this course. Instead of homework assignments, you will submit a written reading response to each assigned paper prior to each class. The goal is for you not only to read and understand the material, but also to develop your unique perspective on it. I do not think you should agree with everything in the reading (and I don't either). Instead, see the readings as arguments for positions that the authors are taking. Your job as a reader is to (1) understand and appreciate the author's arguments, (2) evaluate the persuasiveness of these arguments and their implications, and (3) develop your own informed perspective.

For each reading, you will submit a 200-500 word response. Your response each class should be either positive or negative (but make sure you do a good balance of BOTH positive and negative over the whole semester):

(a) A positive response explaining why this is a good idea and will positively impact the communities and stakeholders involved. Make sure to pick out specific ideas and tactics that resonate with you as being a potentially successful path, idea, vision, theory, etc.

OR

(b) A negative response explaining why this intervention/idea will not be successful and will potentially actively harm/waste resources/or generally not work. Make sure to again cite specific strategies that are naive or harmful, communities or stakeholders whose needs are not taken into account, and other reasons this is a bad idea.

Each writeup is expected to be between 200-500 words and completed in a Google doc. Paste a link to your response in the spreadsheet BEFORE that day's class. During class, we will read, critique, and discuss the paper and your responses.