Title: From Needs to Strengths: Devising Assets-Based Parent-Education ICTs for Latin* Immigrant Parents in the United States

Marisol Wong-Villacres

Ph.D. Candidate

School of Interactive Computing

College of Computing

Georgia Institute of Technology

Date: Tuesday, March 30th, 2021

Time: 12:00pm – 3:00pm (EDT)

Location: Bluejeans Link

Meeting URL

https://bluejeans.com/4050623974?src=join_info

Meeting ID

405 062 397 4

Want to dial in from a phone?

Dial one of the following numbers:

+1.408.419.1715 (United States(San Jose))

+1.408.915.6290 (United States(San Jose))

(see all numbers - https://www.bluejeans.com/numbers)

Enter the meeting ID and passcode followed by #

Connecting from a room system?

Dial: bjn.vc or 199.48.152.152 and enter your meeting ID & passcode

Committee:

----------------

Dr. Betsy DiSalvo (Advisor, School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology),

Dr. Neha Kumar (Advisor, School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology),

Dr. Michael Best (School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology)

Dr. Carl DiSalvo (School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology)

Dr. Ricardo Gomez (Information School, University of Washington)

Dr. Amy Ogan (School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon)

Summary:

----------------

International migration to higher-income countries such as the United States (U.S.) is a worldwide, growing phenomenon. As the number of people moving across the world increases, so does the number of children of immigrants needing support to succeed academically. While a growing number of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) offer parent-education support, these rarely respond to the complex reality of parents from nondominant backgrounds, such as immigrants. When ICTs cater to these groups, they tend to do this via patches to help these parents catch up with mainstream society. By disregarding immigrant parents' strengths and capacities—or assets—to contribute solutions to their own problems, most parent-education ICTs end up perpetuating information inequities. In response, my dissertation works with low-income, Spanish-speaking Latin* immigrant parents to explore design pathways for parent-education ICTs to better respond to parents from nondominant groups.

I approach this problem through an assets-based approach to design, which fosters technology-supported transformations that build on and amplify users' strengths. Through ethnographic fieldwork and Participatory Design (PD) engagements, this dissertation offers two contributions to existing Human-Computer Interaction research on the role of technology in learning, education, and families. First, it contributes a holistic understanding of how information channels in the educational system operate as assets for parents. Second, it proposes assets-based design pathways for parent-education ICTs to support Latin* immigrant parents. This research also contributes to HCI's growing interest in a design process that uplifts strengths by advancing analytical approaches and methodological considerations for facilitating assets-based design in a large-scale system. These contributions can significantly inform critical transformations for technology in educational systems and illuminate a design process that supports vulnerable groups in attaining sustainable, emancipatory changes.