Award Abstract # 2348926
REU Site: The DUB REU Program for Human-Centered Computing Research

NSF Org: CNS
Division Of Computer and Network Systems
Recipient: UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON
Initial Amendment Date: March 29, 2024
Latest Amendment Date: March 29, 2024
Award Number: 2348926
Award Instrument: Standard Grant
Program Manager: Vladimir Pavlovic
vpavlovi@nsf.gov
 (703)292-8318
CNS
 Division Of Computer and Network Systems
CSE
 Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering
Start Date: June 15, 2024
End Date: May 31, 2027 (Estimated)
Total Intended Award Amount: $465,000.00
Total Awarded Amount to Date: $465,000.00
Funds Obligated to Date: FY 2024 = $465,000.00
History of Investigator:
  • Leilani Battle (Principal Investigator)
    leibatt@cs.washington.edu
  • Sayamindu Dasgupta (Co-Principal Investigator)
Recipient Sponsored Research Office: University of Washington
4333 BROOKLYN AVE NE
SEATTLE
WA  US  98195-1016
(206)543-4043
Sponsor Congressional District: 07
Primary Place of Performance: University of Washington
4333 BROOKLYN AVE NE
SEATTLE
WA  US  98195-0001
Primary Place of Performance
Congressional District:
07
Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): HD1WMN6945W6
Parent UEI:
NSF Program(s): RSCH EXPER FOR UNDERGRAD SITES
Primary Program Source: 01002425DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
Program Reference Code(s): 9102, 9250
Program Element Code(s): 113900
Award Agency Code: 4900
Fund Agency Code: 4900
Assistance Listing Number(s): 47.070

ABSTRACT

Technology should be designed to serve people and society. When we fail to make people the focus of our technologies, we run the risk of designing software and hardware that ignores our ethics, our privacy, or even our rights. This REU Site addresses a lack of human-centered scientists, analysts, developers, accessibility experts, and designers in the US computing workforce. Specifically, this REU Site provides undergraduate students with valuable training and research experiences to help them become independent and mindful contributors to society. This REU Site is part of a grassroots alliance of human-centered researchers and practitioners at the University of Washington called Design Use Build (DUB).

Participating REU students will gain a broader understanding of human-centered computing research, gain real-world experience applying human-centered and design methodology to challenging research problems, and develop their technical communication, project management, critical thinking, and independent research skills. The research projects under this REU Site span a wide range of areas of computer science, including AI, machine learning, data science, accessibility, security and privacy, software engineering, databases, robotics, and fabrication. The throughline that ties these projects together is the emphasis on designing hardware and software to enhance human capabilities and agency rather than replace human intelligence. Example projects include: interviewing developers on how they build high quality software and developing corresponding frameworks for measuring code quality; reviewing the literature on how the general public reasons about algorithms so algorithm designers can make them more intuitive; building guardrails around large language models so they can be used for fact-checked content generation; measuring changes in perceived text quality given the disclosure of AI involvement in its generation; and designing programmable media for youth to address structural forms of exclusion such as accessibility, language fluency, and neurodiversity.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.

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