Prof. Nergis Mavalvala has been named the new Dean of MIT’s School of Science, reports Zara Khan for Mashable. Khan notes that Mavalvala “is known for her pioneering work in gravitational wave detection,” and will be the first woman to serve as Dean of the School of Science.
Graduate student Kenyatta McLean speaks with Fast Company reporter Nate Berg about BlackSpace, a non-profit she co-founded that aims to bring communities of color into the urban planning decision-making process. “We know that heritage is such an important part of Black neighborhoods and is something that Black neighborhoods continue to produce and conserve themselves, so we did want to amplify that work,” says McLean.
Writing for New Scientist, Vijaysree Venkatraman spotlights “Coded Bias,” a new documentary that chronicles graduate student Joy Buolamwini’s “journey to uncover racial and sexist bias in face-recognition software and other artificial intelligence systems.”
Fast Company reporter Amy Farley spotlights graduate student Joy Buolamwini and her work battling bias in artificial intelligence systems, noting that “when it comes to AI injustices, her voice resonates.” Buolamwini emphasizes that “we have a voice and a choice in the kind of future we have.”
Fast Company reporter Nate Berg spotlights Lecturer Karilyn Crockett and her new role as Chief of Equity for the City of Boston. “The idea that there is a person who is tasked with explicitly looking at these things is critical, but also, more than just a person or a single office, the idea that there’s a commitment to structural change,” says Crockett.
Washington Post contributor Anna Leahy spotlights Prof. Sasha Costanza-Chock’s book, “Design Justice.” Leahy notes that in the book, Costanza-Chock, “encourages a bolder approach that calls for the world to be redesigned based on an expansive view of people’s bodies and cognitive abilities.”
In an op-ed in The New York Times, MIT President L. Rafael Reif writes that it is “self-defeating” for the U.S. government to signal that it wants foreign students to stay away. “Precisely at a time when we face sharp economic rivalries, we are systematically undermining the very U.S. strength our competitors envy most,” he cautions.
AP reporter Collin Binkley writes that the Department of Homeland Security rescinded a rule that would have barred foreign students from studying in the U.S. “This case also made abundantly clear that real lives are at stake in these matters, with the potential for real harm,” said MIT President L. Rafael Reif. “We need to approach policy making, especially now, with more humanity, more decency — not less.”
WBUR’s Max Larkin and Shannon Dooling report that the Department of Homeland Security has agreed to withdraw its July 6th policy. "Lawyers from across the United States had swarmed behind Harvard and MIT as they challenged the policy,” note Larkin and Dooling. “As of Tuesday morning, the docket showed over a dozen amicus briefs filed in the case’s weeklong history.”
In response to a lawsuit filed by MIT and Harvard, the Department of Homeland Security rescinded a directive that would have prevented thousands of foreign students from studying in the U.S. “It’s a huge relief,” graduate student Angie Jo told The Boston Globe. “I’ve really put down roots here. It would be like leaving home for me.”
A growing number of colleges and universities have “backed Harvard and MIT in their legal challenge to a July 6 directive from the Trump administration requiring international students to take fall classes in-person amid the COVID-19 pandemic to remain in the country, even though many schools have announced plans to hold classes online,” reports Travis Anderson forThe Boston Globe.
Axios reporter Ashley Gold writes that Google, Facebook, Microsoft and a number of other tech companies are joining the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in submitting an amicus brief in support of a lawsuit filed by MIT and Harvard. The suit challenges a new visa policy that would prevent international students from entering the U.S. if they are taking a full online course load during the Covid-19 pandemic.
More than 200 colleges and universities have backed a legal challenge by MIT and Harvard to a new visa policy that would bar thousands of foreign students from studying in the U.S., reports Collin Binkley for the Associated Press. “These students are core members of our institutions,” the schools wrote. “They make valuable contributions to our classrooms, campuses and communities.”
Lecturer Karilyn Crockett speaks with Jim Braude and Margery Eagan of Boston Public Radio about how she plans to address equity in her role as Boston’s Chief Equity. "There's something we're not doing right to really showcase not only the city's richness and prosperity and wealth, and also just letting all of our people truly be in the city, integrated in the city, and just be around," she said.
Karilyn Crockett, a lecturer at MIT, has been named to head Boston’s new equity and inclusion office, reports Erin Tiernan for The Boston Herald. “She will apply an equity lens to make sure everything our city government does is dismantling systemic racism and creating fair opportunity for all Bostonians,” said Boston Mayor Martin Walsh.