Deadline: 18-Jan-23
The Goldman School of Public Policy and the CITRIS Policy Lab has partnered to launch a transformative Tech Policy Initiative, which aims to strengthen multidisciplinary scholarly collaborations, foster tech policy education, and innovation, and inform effective tech-related policy strategies across the public and private sectors.
The UC Berkeley Tech Policy Fellows program offers scholars and practitioners the opportunity to spend six months to a year as a non-residential fellow at UC Berkeley to conduct research; share expertise and experiences with faculty, staff, and students; and develop technical or policy interventions that support responsible technology development and use. Fellows will have the opportunity to collaborate with each other; to engage with faculty, staff, and students; and to contribute in meaningful ways to the UC Berkeley academic community.
Themes
They seek to attract a diverse cohort of fellows from different backgrounds, disciplines, and sectors (e.g., industry, journalism, government, civil society, academia) who would like to pursue a project in one or more of the following thematic areas:
- Responsible development and use of artificial intelligence in the public and private sectors
- Effective content moderation at scale
- Prosocial recommender systems
- Mitigating and/or effectively countering harmful mis- and disinformation
- Responsible platform data scraping
- Blockchain in the public sector (e.g., health, government services)
- Relationship between EU policy strategies (e.g., Digital Services Act, Digital Markets Act, Data Governance Act, and EU AI Act) and US policy strategies (e.g., Platform Accountability and Transparency Act, NIST AI Risk Management Framework, National AI Initiative Act)
- And other proposed topics related to responsible technology and policy
Pillars
The Tech Policy Initiative is founded on three central pillars: Education, Collaborative Research, and Changemaker Engagement.
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Education
- The Tech Policy Initiative provides students with the diverse skills necessary to understand and address complex tech policy challenges.
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Goals
- Providing all students with strong analytical skills; interdisciplinary knowledge; a firm grounding in core issues concerning the development, implementation, and impacts of technology; as well as effective communication, negotiation, and collaboration skills
- Creating a diverse pipeline of tech-savvy policy leaders and policy-savvy technologists with a strong commitment to public good
- Giving students real-world experiences and valuable employment skills related to tech policy
- Fostering deep critical engagement about the transformative impacts of technological change and how best to address them
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Collaborative Research
- The Tech Policy Initiative supports collaboration between researchers in public policy with complementary disciplines, such as computer science and engineering, data science, social science, and law.
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Goals
- Identifying effective policy interventions to address complex tech policy challenges (e.g., disinformation, cybersecurity, data privacy, eroding public trust, economic impacts)
- Investigating the role of public policy in supporting the transformative potential of technology to solve significant human problems (e.g., climate change, global poverty, health, homelessness)
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Changemaker Engagement
- The Tech Policy Initiative strives to empower stakeholders to become changemakers, by sharing best practices and co-designing innovative, research-driven approaches to responsible tech development, implementation, and governance.
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Goals
- Working with public and private sector stakeholders to help build bridges, foster collaboration across silos, scale and share best practices, and build public support and trust for responsible tech development, implementation, and governance
- Supporting tech policy leadership by helping to inform decision makers, enable better policies, and support responsible tech development and deployment while ensuring that public voices, public interest, and justice are foregrounded at every stage
Benefits
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Fellows will receive:
- A UC Berkeley email address and Google workspace account
- Access to university libraries and collections
- Access to a mentorship network and research support
- Opportunities to share and receive feedback on current research and works in progress
- Opportunities to engage and collaborate with faculty, staff, and students on research and/or practical interventions related to responsible technology development and governance
- Opportunities to engage with UC Berkeley faculty, staff, and students and serve as an advisor, mentor, or collaborator.
- Opportunities to help organize and host tech policy-related events and convenings
- Access to a wide range of conferences, symposia, and other events hosted by UC Berkeley
- Access to workshops and other professional development opportunities
- Tailored workshop on writing an effective policy memo or op-ed based on their research
- Support in submitting an opinion piece to mainstream news outlets or relevant blogs
- Opportunities to present their work and share expertise in public seminars and in undergraduate and graduate courses
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Fellows are expected to:
- Participate in periodic Zoom calls with their fellowship cohort
- Publish their research article or white paper on the CITRIS Policy Lab website and on relevant partnering organizations’ websites
Eligibility Criteria
- Applications are now open for scholars, journalists, and practitioners to spend six months to a year as a non-residential fellow conducting research; working on responsible technical/policy interventions; and engaging with the extended UC Berkeley academic community.
- Up to six Tech Policy Fellows will be selected.
- Fellowships are for up to one year and will be primarily non-residential, although local participants are welcome to attend and participate in on-campus events, meetings, and other activities. At this time, fellows should not expect to receive financial remuneration.
- This opportunity is currently not available for students enrolled in undergraduate or graduate programs.
For more information, visit Goldman School of Public Policy.
