Advancing opportunity

Our institution was, quite literally, the birthplace of the American Dream — it was our alum James Truslow Adams (1898) who coined that phrase back in 1931, when he wrote of: “that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement ... a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position.”

At NYU Tandon, we have long been committed to ensuring that aspiring engineers and technologists of all cultures, ethnicities, genders, and socioeconomic levels have a chance to bring their own dreams to fruition, whether that means providing a pathway to the middle class and beyond for less economically advantaged students or working with New York City’s K-12 school children to introduce them to the possibilities of higher education.

Working to become a more equitable, inclusive engine of academic opportunity is not enough, however. As an engineering school, we’re creating next-generation technology that will increasingly define access to housing, healthcare, employment, transportation, and more, and we conduct our research with that foremost in mind.

It’s a multifaceted approach that ensures that we’re educating a diverse group of STEM professionals able to tackle a diverse set of challenges, equitably, transparently, and with an eye towards making the world a better place for all.

Opportunity-centered tech is key to a more equitable and diverse future

As research institutions, engineering schools are perfectly positioned to create next-generation technology that accounts for inherent bias, measures disparities, increases accessibility for the differently abled, and opens world-changing possibilities in sometimes unexpected ways. Many of our research centers are actively engaged in that mission, including:

• The Center for Responsible AI is building open-source tools and frameworks for equitable data-sharing, more transparent algorithmic decision-making systems, and more — with an eye towards a future in which responsible AI is the only kind accepted by society.
• Connected Cities with Smart Mobility to Equitably Reduce Congestion (C2SMARTER) is a USDOT Tier 1 University Transportation research center that has collaborated with the New York City MTA’s Accessible Station Lab for subways, created an on-demand tool to support senior access to mobility, and researched how women may be paying a premium for transportation in urban environments, among other initiatives.
• NYU WIRELESS researchers are seeking ways to expand broadband service to underserved parts of the world, bridging the digital divide, and to provide greater capability and functionality to mobile device users.

A small sampling of some of our recent projects reveals our commitment to expanding opportunity in every sector.

• Following the COVID-19 pandemic, telemedicine became a necessary entry point into the process of diagnosis, triage and treatment. With racial and ethnic disparities in health care well documented with respect to risk of infection and in-hospital outcomes, Rumi Chunara, an associate professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at NYU Tandon, and in the Department of Biostatistics at NYU School of Global Public Health, as well as a member of the Center for Urban Science + Progress, saw the need to assess disparities for those who accessed care for the virus via telemedicine. Discovering that telemedicine access disparities reflect those of in-person healthcare access, she and her colleagues hope that their work can be used to inform tool design and systemic efforts to promote digital health equity.
• Facial recognition technology has made great strides in accuracy thanks to advanced artificial intelligence (AI) models trained on massive datasets of face images. However, these datasets often lack diversity in terms of race, ethnicity, gender, and other demographic categories, causing facial recognition systems to perform worse on underrepresented demographic groups compared to groups ubiquitous in the training data. Our researchers have successfully reduced facial recognition bias by generating highly diverse and balanced synthetic face datasets that can train facial recognition AI models to produce more fair results.
  

  

• C2SMARTER recently funded a project measuring air quality in the New York subway and found that low-income Black and Hispanic riders, who often have longer commutes and multiple transfers, face disproportionately higher exposure. Pollution levels are particularly high at certain stations, including 168th Street and Bowling Green. The researchers, led by Professor Masoud Ghandehari, developed an interactive map for riders to calculate their personal exposure on different routes.
• Since 2016, Tandon students, with the support of the NYU Ability Project, have been making custom, 3D-printed orthotics for young patients with cerebral palsy — an especially important initiative since insurance companies often refuse to pay to replace outgrown braces in a timely way.
• Industry Assistant Professor Reginé Gilbert literally wrote the book on accessible design: she’s the author of Inclusive Design for a Digital World: Designing with Accessibility in Mind, a comprehensive volume that explores the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, best practices for web development, and more.
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  Research that aims to optimize the placement of electric vehicle (EV) charging stations with a focus on supporting small businesses and promoting social equity is well underway at NYU Tandon with support from a National Science Foundation (NSF) collaborative research grant.

Developing technology that contributes to society in some way has always been a major part of our ethos, and among the biggest contributions we can make going forward is to create systems and devices that promote equity and open doors for all.

The American Dream requires varied, innovative, and evolving pathways

The nation looked very different back in 1854, when the small polytechnic institute that was the precursor to the NYU Tandon School of Engineering opened its doors. Then, the ambitious first-generation Americans who flocked to the school hailed from places like Italy, Germany, Poland, and Russia, and used their engineering education as a stepping stone to the middle class and beyond.

New generations of Pell-eligible students who are, in many cases, the first in their immediate families to attend college, continue to arrive at our doors and be welcomed. Our Inclusion @ Tandon Committee has created a far-reaching strategy that incorporates K-12 efforts and career pipeline initiatives; establishes an atmosphere of support for each and every student at Tandon; and attracts a diverse faculty eager to serve as mentors. That’s important, because solving the world’s problems requires a diversity of perspectives, lived experiences, and intellectual capital, and that can only happen in a diverse, vibrant environment, where people from different backgrounds collaborate.

We’re expanding the STEM pipeline from K-12 to far beyond the mortarboard

Often, conversation about building a pipeline into education starts, as it should, with the youngest aspiring scientists, technologists, and engineers, as happens at Tandon’s Center for K12 STEM Education. But what about creating opportunities for advancement for those who are already in the workforce? Could the process be opened to those from non-traditional backgrounds? That’s the goal of the Bridge to Tandon initiative, a novel distance-learning program designed to provide those who have little background in science or engineering with the tools they need to apply for master’s degree programs in highly technical fields like bioinformatics, cybersecurity, data science, and robotics. It could also mean helping companies upskill their existing workforce — those already in the pipeline — by offering microcredentials or other learning opportunities.

We live for the day people don’t talk about “women in STEM” — just accomplished scientists, technologists, creators, and engineers who also happen to be women. Until then, we aim to be a leader in building a supportive environment where we all work together to increase women’s representation, retention, and success through a wide range of programs, services and activities, including the WoMentorship Program and the Women in Engineering Explorations Community at the Othmer Residence Hall. Our efforts are paying off: women made up 40% of the Class of 2024, about double the national average for engineering schools.

Our Office of Inclusive Excellence also oversees the My Brother's Keeper @ Tandon initiative, aimed at doing the ongoing work, vigilance, and in-depth discussion required to be active allies of Black and Latino STEM scholars and industry professionals and IdeaScale, a platform where the NYU Tandon community can share ideas to enhance Inclusion, Diversity, Belonging, and Equity (IDBE), because everyone is a stakeholder in that mission.

An NYU project funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) promises to bolster the number of women faculty leaders and mentors in the university’s science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) academic departments, via a slate of new resources and processes. With a $1.25 million NSF grant, NYU has launched the InterScience ADVANCE project, a systemic approach to enhance the representation, career longevity, success and satisfaction of women STEM faculty at NYU. The School has also spearheaded Project Elevate, a collaboration with Carnegie Mellon University and Johns Hopkins University to increase diversity among STEM faculty. Elevate is funded by the National Science Foundation Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP) program.

Our faculty-diversification efforts expand well past our own doors: our Faculty First Look initiative invites underrepresented doctoral candidates and postdoctoral fellows working in engineering fields, who are passionate about science and driven to make the world a better place, to Brooklyn, to participate in a series of workshops aimed at helping them navigate the academic job market.

It’s accurate to say, we’re engineering opportunity in every way possible.