{"676266":{"#nid":"676266","#data":{"type":"news","title":"IPaT Seed Funding Awarded to Four Projects","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EThe Institute for People and Technology at Georgia Tech (IPaT), the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), and Brook Byers Institute for Sustainable Systems co-sponsored $54,000 in seed grant awards to four research projects. The goal of the grants for 2024-25 is to promote research activities involving faculty and students from the many disciplines represented in IPaT. Engagement grants are also designed to foster new collaborations internal or external to Georgia Tech.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cCongratulations to this year\u2019s four winning research teams,\u201d said Michael Best, executive director of IPaT. \u201cThese projects explore sustainability, AI, education, artistic learning, and critical computing. They all advance IPaT\u2019s goal to develop technologies that empower people from all walks of life.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ECongratulations to these winning project teams:\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EProposal Title:\u003C\/strong\u003E Making Sustainability Data Public on the Georgia Tech Library Media Bridge\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ETeam Members:\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/strong\u003EYanni Loukissas, associate professor, School of Literature, Media and Communication; Emily Weigel, senior academic professional, School of Biological Sciences; Alison Valk, Jason Wright, and Charlie Bennett with the Georgia Tech Library; Steve Place, Jermaine Clonts, and Svetlana Sorok with the Georgia Tech Office of Sustainability.\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EResearch Overview:\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/strong\u003EOur research idea is to study the social effects of fostering creative, public experiences with real-time, sustainability-related data on campus with the long-term goal of learning what a resource-conscious campus community might look like. Our approach will be to develop an interactive data visualization prototype for the Georgia Tech Library Media Bridge that will visualize real-time water use data in 47 student housing buildings. This visualization will serve as an adaptable research instrument through which to explore the potential for public experiences with data. It will challenge student residents to reflect on and take practical steps to change the environmental footprint of the places where they live. This research project is co-funded with Georgia Tech\u0027s \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/research.gatech.edu\/sustainability\u0022\u003EBrook Byers Institute for Sustainable Systems\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EProposal title:\u003C\/strong\u003E Computational Design AI System to Empower Maker Educators\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ETeam members:\u003C\/strong\u003E HyunJoo Oh, assistant professor, School of Industrial Design and School of Interactive Computing; Sehoon Ha, assistant professor, School of Interactive Computing; Sabrina Grossman, program director, Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics, and Computing at Georgia Tech.\u0026nbsp;\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EResearch overview:\u003C\/strong\u003E The rise of design and fabrication tools like 3D printers and microcontrollers has expanded maker education from K-12 to higher education. However, access remains a challenge, especially for underprivileged youth. Teachers often struggle to lead maker-centered activities due to a lack of design and engineering expertise, which particularly affects students in low-resource districts where school activities may be their only exposure to creative learning. To address this, we propose developing a web-based AI system that empowers teachers to lead kinetic design and engineering projects. Through participatory design with experienced teachers, the system will assist with project design and offer customized instructional guidance by identifying challenging steps and potential recovery solutions and adapting content to meet teachers\u2019 needs.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EProposal title:\u003C\/strong\u003E Democratizing Creative Agency Through Interactive Technologies and Music Education\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ETeam members:\u003C\/strong\u003E Moeiini Reilly, research technologist, GTRI, and human-centered computing Ph.D. student with the School of Interactive Computing; Paul Brancato, research engineer, GTRI; Nicole Brancato, composer and music educator.\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EResearch overview:\u003C\/strong\u003E Artistic computing learning environments play a crucial role in promoting equity and inclusion in computing by offering diverse opportunities to learn computational thinking through culturally relevant programming. Despite advances in science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics (STEAM) education, there remains a significant gap in understanding how learners interact with and design creatively in these constructionist settings, as well as how the materiality of computational artifacts influences learning processes, meaning-making, and creative agency. This research seeks to build a framework for centering social and cultural dimensions of artistic learning within computational environments augmented by low-cost, technology-enhanced music education.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EProposal Title:\u003C\/strong\u003E\u0026nbsp;Fostering the Landscape of \u201cCritical Computing\u201d at Georgia Tech\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ETeam Members:\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/strong\u003ERichmond Wong, assistant professor, School of Literature, Media, and Communication; Heidi Biggs, assistant professor, School of Literature, Media, and Communication; Carl DiSalvo, professor, School of Interactive Computing; Betsy DiSalvo, professor, School of Interactive Computing.\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EResearch Overview:\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/strong\u003ECritical computing interrogates the social values, normative orientations, and unintended consequences of computing applications, and it is quickly coming to occupy a central place in research and practice among Georgia Tech researchers and their larger research communities. We seek to build a transdisciplinary critical computing research community at Georgia Tech spanning computing, the social sciences, humanities, and related disciplines. Through a working group and symposium series, we will explore the methods, concepts, theories, history, funding, and evaluation of critical computing research. We will investigate approaches to critical computing research that foreground issues of social values and ethics, engage in just and equitable research approaches, explore new forms of communication and expression, and seek to pursue meaningful alternatives to the status quo.\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EThe Institute for People and Technology at Georgia Tech (IPaT), the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), and Brook Byers Institute for Sustainable Systems co-sponsored $54,000 in seed grant awards to four research projects.\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"The Institute for People and Technology at Georgia Tech (IPaT), the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), and Brook Byers Institute for Sustainable Systems co-sponsored $54,000 in seed grant awards to four research projects."}],"uid":"27513","created_gmt":"2024-08-27 13:15:37","changed_gmt":"2024-10-09 19:52:27","author":"Walter Rich","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2024-08-27T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2024-08-27T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"674720":{"id":"674720","type":"image","title":"IPaT Seed Grants fall 2024","body":"\u003Cp\u003EPictured clockwise: Yanni Loukissas, HyunJoo Oh, Richmond Wong, and Moeiini Reilly\u003C\/p\u003E","created":"1724764279","gmt_created":"2024-08-27 13:11:19","changed":"1724764326","gmt_changed":"2024-08-27 13:12:06","alt":"Pictured clockwise: Yanni Loukissas, HyunJoo Oh, Richmond Wong, and Moeiini Reilly","file":{"fid":"258277","name":"4 pictures.png","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/2024\/08\/27\/4%20pictures.png","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/2024\/08\/27\/4%20pictures.png","mime":"image\/png","size":270811,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/2024\/08\/27\/4%20pictures.png?itok=AMWsh5zz"}}},"media_ids":["674720"],"groups":[{"id":"69599","name":"IPaT"}],"categories":[],"keywords":[{"id":"188084","name":"go-ipat"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:walter.rich@research.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EWalter Rich\u003C\/a\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["walter.rich@research.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}