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Conscientious Technology Design Workshop
Each summer, Cornell's Siegel PiTech PhD Impact Fellows spend eight weeks learning to surface, debate, and design for the human values at stake in public-interest technology — using the Values at Play framework, alongside the organizations they serve.
The fellows
2026 Cohort
Nine PhD researchers, each embedded with a partner organization across health care, city government, disability services, and the public sector — bringing the workshop's questions back to real projects.
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Maimonides Medical Center
Alaa Daffalla
Optimizing ambient clinical AI (Abridge) for physician use — studying hallucination and safety in clinical note generation.
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Center for Family Support (CFS)
Daniel Enriquez
AR/VR tools that help residents of IDD group homes visualize and communicate needs and improvements to their spaces.
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Mayor's Office of Contract Services (MOCS)
Harold “Hal” Triedman
A system to flag duplicate and fraudulent invoices among NYC's contractor payments.
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NYC Office of Technology & Innovation — AI/ML
Isabel Corpus
Policy research for OTI's new algorithmic-accountability office: operationalizing pre- and post-deployment AI risk assessment and reporting.
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NYC Department for the Aging
Jingruo Chen
AI-assisted menu planning and ingredient-level extraction to improve large-scale senior meal programs.
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National Women's Hall of Fame
Nanyi Jiang
Designing and prototyping a new museum experience that uses AI and XR to represent women's archival voices.
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NYC Council Data Team
Suvadip Sana
A retrieval-augmented-generation (RAG) tool for legislative policy research and bill drafting.
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Ability Beyond
Tan Gemicioglu
Bed sensors in residential facilities to ensure timely repositioning and prevent pressure sores.
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Environmental Defense Fund — MethaneSAT
Tanvir Ahmed
Data and algorithmic infrastructure turning MethaneSAT satellite data into actionable, well-communicated methane estimates.
What it is
A reflective space for public-interest technologists
The Conscientious Technology Design Workshop is a light-lift, participatory series for PiTech Impact Fellows. The overarching question we sit with together:
What does it mean to build and evaluate technology in the public interest?
Our anchor is Values at Play (VAP) — the framework developed by Mary Flanagan and Helen Nissenbaum. It gives designers a practical method to surface the values embedded in a technology (Discovery), translate them into concrete design choices (Implementation), and check whether the result lives up to them (Verification). Fellows apply it directly to the projects they are building with their host organizations.
2026 at a glance
- Kickoff seminar
- Wed, June 3, 2026 · 4–8 pm ET · Bloomberg BLM61 (remote option). Intro to VAP and prior-year outcomes, then a hands-on, on-paper Discovery activity.
- Check-ins
- A series of one-on-one check-ins (~45 min each) with DLI instructors, bi-weekly across June–July.
- Final session
- ~1.5 hours with the whole cohort at the end of July.
- Deliverable
- A brief reflective write-up connecting workshop themes to your PiTech project.
- Time & stipend
- ~10 hours total over 8 weeks, plus $600 in discretionary funding on write-up submission.
Who runs it
Organizers
Convened by the Digital Life Initiative in partnership with the Siegel PiTech program at Cornell Tech.
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Hauke Sandhaus
Workshop co-lead · Cornell Tech
PhD researcher at Cornell Tech and a 2022 PiTech Impact Fellow (YAI), whose seizure-monitoring case is part of the 2025 study below.
Academic website → -
Jae June Lee
Workshop co-lead · Cornell Tech
Information Science researcher at Cornell, co-leading the workshop's Discovery and Definition activities with the fellows.
University profile → -
Helen Nissenbaum
Faculty supervisor · Director, Digital Life Initiative
Professor at Cornell Tech and co-author of the Values at Play framework the workshop teaches.
Academic website →
Looking back
2025 Cohort & their value tensions
The previous cohort each worked through a real tension between competing values. Their cases form the basis of our forthcoming research paper. Read their reflections below, or browse the full 2025 workshop schedule →
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JustFix · legal-tech nonprofit
Andrea Wang
Innovationvs.Accuracy & privacy
An LLM housing-rights chatbot helping NYC tenants navigate the law.
Read the spotlight → -
NYC Public Schools
Erica Chiang
Equal accessvs.Inclusion
A high-school recommendation intervention for students.
Reflection forthcoming -
NYC Emergency Management
Jennah Gosciak
Accuracyvs.Stakeholder agency
ML extreme-heat risk prediction and maps to support emergency operations.
Read the spotlight → -
NYC Office of Technology & Innovation
Kiara Liu
Accessibilityvs.Inclusion
An evaluation rubric for machine translation in municipal use cases.
Read the spotlight → -
Riders Alliance · transit advocacy
Laura Greenstreet
Equityvs.Affordability
Bus-route performance analysis and interventions for NYC riders.
Read the spotlight → -
Center for Family Support (CFS)
Olzhas Yessenbayev
Safetyvs.Dignity
Smart-home sensors supporting independent living in IDD residences.
Read the spotlight → -
Young Adult Institute (YAI)
Hauke Sandhaus
Privacyvs.Safety · Dignity · Autonomy
Computer-vision seizure monitoring — the “Privacy Carousel.”
Workshop organizer and 2022 fellow; case included in the 2025 study.
Read the essay →
Research
Values in Public Interest Tech: Practicing Conscientious Design
Coming soon Under review
Drawing on the 2025 cohort's cases, this paper studies how public-interest technologists put values into practice — and what the Values at Play framework looks like in the field. We'll link the published version here once it is accepted.
Get involved
Apply & connect
For prospective fellows
The workshop is offered to fellows of the Siegel PiTech PhD Impact Fellowship. The 2026 cohort has been selected; the fellowship runs each year.
About the PiTech FellowshipQuestions
Reach the organizers through their profiles above, or learn more about the host programs at the Digital Life Initiative and PiTech.