Note from PiTech Initiative Director, Malgosia Rejniak
Siegel PhD Impact Fellowship
Seeing the finalized cohort of Siegel PiTech PhD Impact Fellows has been the most rewarding aspect of my work as PiTech Initiative Director. Much thoughtful curation goes into matching students with organizations, both from the PiTech Initiative side, as well as on the part of our wonderful partners, to align students’ interests and skills and organizations’ specific technical needs. I’m very excited to announce the Fellows and their hosts for Summer 2024!
The Siegel PiTech PhD Impact Fellowship supports Cornell University PhD students in technical fields through 12-week summer externships with nonprofit and public sector organizations. We have witnessed rapidly growing demand from PhD students for the Fellowship, having gone from 15 applicants for Summer 2022 to 54 for Summer 2024. Similarly, nonprofit and public sector organizations from across many issue areas have welcomed the opportunity to participate in the Fellowship to engage students’ technical skills in machine learning, data science, LLMs, human-centered design, and AR/VR.
We are honored to have them join us!
Dan Adler, Medicare Rights Center - Exploring how AI tools can assist staff and volunteers serving Medicare beneficiaries on Medicare Rights' national helpline.
Lucy Jiang, Design Trust for Public Space - Exploring digital strategies to evaluate and enhance neurodiversity accessibility in public spaces.
Hyunju Kim, Martha Graham School - Examining the implications of immersive technologies on choreographic, archival, and pedagogical practices.
Amritansh Kwatra, New York Public Library - Developing functional patron-centric material classifications.
Bo Liu, Ability Beyond - Developing smart home sensors that alert caregivers when patients need repositioning, aiming to prevent skin integrity breakdown and improve patient care through timely interventions.
Kenny Peng, Cornell Center for Applied Research on Work - Developing a comprehensive framework and algorithmic approach to help facilitate job search for justice-impacted individuals
Tauhid Tanjim, NYC Health + Hospitals - Refining the existing prediction model for acute care settings and tackling aspects of Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) in Electronic Health Records (EHR) to mitigate healthcare disparities in the NYC community.
Trang Tran, Adapt Community Network - Implement smart technologies and/or artificial intelligence to help people with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities live more independently and reduce the reliance on Direct Support Professional Staff.
Yuheng Wang, NYC Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) - Developing algorithmic solutions to improve the efficiency of staff routing assignments within the Bureau of Water and Sewer Operations.
Tobias Weinberg, YAI - Exploring ways to collect data from smart home technology in one place to measure progress, determine impact of technology on quality of life, and explore impact on staffing patterns.
