Between 2018 and 2021 PIs for National Science Foundation Awards # 1758781 and 1758814 EAGER: Collaborative Research: Developing and Testing an Incubator for Digital Entrepreneurship in Remote Communities, in partnership with the Tanana Chiefs Conference, the traditional tribal consortium of the 42 villages of Interior Alaska, jointly developed and conducted large-scale digital and in-person surveys of multiple Alaskan interior communities. The survey was distributed via a combination of in-person paper surveys, digital surveys, social media links, verbal in-person interviews and telephone-based responses. Analysis of this measure using SAS demonstrated the statistically significant need for enhanced digital infrastructure and reworked digital entrepreneurial and technological education in the Tanana Chiefs Conference region. 1. Two statistical measures were created during this research: Entrepreneurial Readiness (ER) and Digital Technology needs and skills (DT), both of which showed high measures of internal consistency (.89, .81). 2. The measures revealed entrepreneurial readiness challenges and evidence of specific addressable barriers that are currently preventing (serving as hindrances) to regional digital economic activity. The survey data showed statistically significant correlation with the mixed-methodological in-person focus groups and interview research conducted by the PIs and TCC collaborators in Hughes and Huslia, AK, which further corroborated stated barriers to entrepreneurship development in the region. 3. Data generated by the survey and fieldwork is maintained by the Tanana Chiefs Conference under data sovereignty agreements. The survey and focus group data contains aggregated statistical/empirical data as well as qualitative/subjective detail that runs the risk of becoming personally identifiable especially due to (but not limited to) to concerns with exceedingly small Arctic community population sizes. 4. This metadata is being provided in order to serve as a record of the data collection and analysis conducted, and also to share some high-level findings that, while revealing no personal information, may be helpful for policymaking, regional planning and efforts towards educational curricular development and infrastructural investment. The sample demographics consist of 272 women, 79 men, and 4 with gender not indicated as a response. Barriers to Entrepreneurial Readiness were a component of the measure. Lack of education is the #1 barrier, followed closely by lack of access to childcare. Among women who participated in the survey measure, 30% with 2 or more children report lack of childcare to be a significant barrier to entrepreneurial and small business activity. For entrepreneurial readiness and digital economy, the scales perform well from a psychometric standpoint. The summary scores are roughly normally distributed. Cronbach’s alphas are greater than 0.80 for both. They are moderately correlated with each other (r = 0.48, p < .0001). Men and women do not differ significantly on either measure. Education is significantly related to the digital economy measure. The detail provided in the survey related to educational needs enabled optimized development of the Incubator for Digital Entrepreneurship in Remote Communities. Enhanced digital entrepreneurship training with clear cultural linkages to traditions and community needs, along with additional childcare opportunities are two among several specific recommendations provided to the TCC. The project PIs are working closely with the TCC administration and community members related to elements of culturally-aligned curricular development that respects data tribal sovereignty, local data management protocols, data anonymity and adherence to human subjects (IRB) protocols. While the survey data is currently embargoed and unable to be submitted publicly for reasons of anonymity, the project PIs are working with the NSF Arctic Data Center towards determining pathways for sharing personally-protected data with the larger scientific community. These approaches may consist of aggregating and digitally anonymizing sensitive data in ways that cannot be de-aggregated and that meet agency and scientific community needs (while also fully respecting and protecting participants’ rights and personal privacy). At present the data sensitivity protocols are not yet adapted to TCC requirements and the datasets will remain in their care.
more »
« less
Digital empowerment for whom? An analysis of ‘Network sovereignty’ in low-income, rural communities in Mexico and Tanzania
When researchers invoke the term ‘last billion’ to refer to emerging ICT users, they often focus on network access as a ‘solution’ while neglecting important considerations such as local ownership or knowledge, both of which are essential to sustainable and empowering uses of these technologies in developing contexts. Research reveals that mere access to networks without active community involvement can fail to empower already marginalized and disenfranchized users. Building upon these findings, this article uses ethnographic methods to explore the meanings of ‘network sovereignty’ in rural, low-income communities in developing countries. It presents two case studies focused on local network initiatives in Oaxaca, Mexico and Bunda, Tanzania and then offers an assessment matrix to support future network sovereignty research based on five categories: community engagement; local cultures/ontologies; digital education and technological knowledge; economic ownership; and community empowerment. Our comparative research reveals that communities that are able to assert collective ownership over local infrastructure, embed network initiatives within local cultures, and prioritize digital education are much more likely to create and sustain local networks that support their economic, political, and cultural lives.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 1755106
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10288260
- Editor(s):
- Loader, B.
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Information communication society
- Volume:
- online
- Issue:
- online
- ISSN:
- 1369-118X
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
As we look to the future of natural history collections and a global integration of biodiversity data, we are reliant on a diverse workforce with the skills necessary to build, grow, and support the data, tools, and resources of the Digital Extended Specimen (DES; Webster 2019, Lendemer et al. 2020, Hardisty 2020). Future “DES Data Curators” – those who will be charged with maintaining resources created through the DES – will require skills and resources beyond what is currently available to most natural history collections staff. In training the workforce to support the DES we have an opportunity to broaden our community and ensure that, through the expansion of biodiversity data, the workforce landscape itself is diverse, equitable, inclusive, and accessible. A fully-implemented DES will provide training that encapsulates capacity building, skills development, unifying protocols and best practices guidance, and cutting-edge technology that also creates inclusive, equitable, and accessible systems, workflows, and communities. As members of the biodiversity community and the current workforce, we can leverage our knowledge and skills to develop innovative training models that: include a range of educational settings and modalities; address the needs of new communities not currently engaged with digital data; from their onset, provide attribution for past and future work and do not perpetuate the legacy of colonial practices and historic inequalities found in many physical natural history collections. Recent reports from the Biodiversity Collections Network (BCoN 2019) and the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine 2020) specifically address workforce needs in support of the DES. To address workforce training and inclusivity within the context of global data integration, the Alliance for Biodiversity Knowledge included a topic on Workforce capacity development and inclusivity in Phase 2 of the consultation on Converging Digital Specimens and Extended Specimens - Towards a global specification for data integration. Across these efforts, several common themes have emerged relative to workforce training and the DES. A call for a community needs assessment: As a community, we have several unknowns related to the current collections workforce and training needs. We would benefit from a baseline assessment of collections professionals to define current job responsibilities, demographics, education and training, incentives, compensation, and benefits. This includes an evaluation of current employment prospects and opportunities. Defined skills and training for the 21st century collections professional: We need to be proactive and define the 21st century workforce skills necessary to support the development and implementation of the DES. When we define the skills and content needs we can create appropriate training opportunities that include scalable materials for capacity building, educational materials that develop relevant skills, unifying protocols across the DES network, and best practices guidance for professionals. Training for data end-users: We need to train data end-users in biodiversity and data science at all levels of formal and informal education from primary and secondary education through the existing workforce. This includes developing training and educational materials, creating data portals, and building analyses that are inclusive, accessible, and engage the appropriate community of science educators, data scientists, and biodiversity researchers. Foster a diverse, equitable, inclusive, and accessible and professional workforce: As the DES develops and new tools and resources emerge, we need to be intentional in our commitment to building tools that are accessible and in assuring that access is equitable. This includes establishing best practices to ensure the community providing and accessing data is inclusive and representative of the diverse global community of potential data providers and users. Upfront, we must acknowledge and address issues of historic inequalities and colonial practices and provide appropriate attribution for past and future work while ensuring legal and regulatory compliance. Efforts must include creating transparent linkages among data and the humans that create the data that drives the DES. In this presentation, we will highlight recommendations for building workforce capacity within the DES that are diverse, inclusive, equitable and accessible, take into account the requirements of the biodiversity science community, and that are flexible to meet the needs of an evolving field.more » « less
-
The aim to sequence, catalog, and characterize the genomes of all of Earth’s eukaryotic biodiversity is the shared mission of many ongoing large-scale biodiversity genomics initiatives. Reference genomes of global flora and fauna have the potential to inform a broad range of major issues facing both biodiversity and humanity, such as the impact of climate change, the conservation of endangered species and ecosystems, public health crises, and the preservation and enhancement of ecosystem services. Biodiversity is dramatically declining: 28% of species being assessed by the IUCN are threatened with extinction, and recent reports suggest that a transformative change is needed to conserve and protect what remains. To provide a collective and global genomic response to the biodiversity crisis, many biodiversity genomics initiatives have come together, creating a network of networks under the Earth BioGenome Project. This network seeks to expedite the creation of an openly available, “public good” encyclopedia of high-quality eukaryotic reference genomes, in the hope that by advancing our basic understanding of nature, it can lead to the transformational scientific developments needed to conserve and protect global biodiversity. Key to completing this ambitious encyclopedia of reference genomes, is the ability to responsibly, ethically, legally, and equitably access and use samples from all of the eukaryotic species across the planet, including those that are under the custodianship of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities. Here, the biodiversity genomics community is subject to the provisions codified in international, national, and local legislations and customary community norms, principles, and protocols. We propose a framework to support biodiversity genomic researchers, projects, and initiatives in building trustworthy and sustainable partnerships with communities, providing minimum recommendations on how to access, utilize, preserve, handle, share, analyze, and communicate samples, genomics data, and associated Traditional Knowledge obtained from, and in partnership with, Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities across the data-lifecycle.more » « less
-
Digital publishing platforms and internet resources enable openness of access to scientific findings and data at scales never before realized. Unfortunately, researchers sometimes embrace lock-in systems for data generation and analysis out of necessity because meaningful alternatives do not exist. Scientific advances still take place when this occurs, but they become fragmented with discordant quality control, interoperability, reproducibility, and democratization of access. To maximize the value of these—often—publicly funded resources, disciplines are turning to FAIR Guiding Principles for data stewardship. FAIR (Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, and Reuse) promotes the added value of widespread data sharing that is transparent, equitable, and inclusive. Here we present NoCTURN, an NSF-funded FAIR Open Science Research Coordination Network for computed tomography users. NoCTURN (the Non-clinical Computed Tomography Users Research Network) aims to address the fragmentation of tomography toolkits stemming from proprietary software, non-uniform metadata formats, and repeatability limits. In this presentation, we outline how we will achieve this aim together by 1) developing a community committed to information sharing; 2) coordinating data analysis, storage, and reporting requirements; 3) highlighting underrepresented voices in the field; 4) developing community standards inclusive of industry, research, education, and outreach stake-holders; and 5) modeling FAIR open science strategies for our colleagues and students. NoCTURN is recruiting undergraduates through established investigators from X-ray-, neutron-, and synchrotron-beam computed tomography communities—and we want to hear from you.more » « less
-
more » « less
Abstract Internet of Things (IoT) sensor networks are an emerging technology at the center of the datafication and optimization of far-reaching environmental infrastructures—from “smart cities” to workplace efficiencies. However, this low-power, low-cost technology is also well suited to local deployments in rural communities, which are often overlooked by digital development initiatives. Therefore, we used a social construction of technology approach to study how various U.S.-based IoT stakeholders—including designers and advocates as well as citizen stakeholders—understand and value sensor network technologies. Through observational methods, in-depth interviews, and participatory design research in a rural Upstate New York municipality, we worked to design sensor networks with rural community members to generate data about and for community members to further local knowledge. We found that designing rural sensor networks requires stakeholders to navigate obstacles of communication about sensors and communication through sensors to facilitate secure, ethical, and localized sensing in rural communities.
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
-
Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- The DOI is not currently available.
