IAP 2025 Paid UROP Opportunity

How might we collectively shape a more sustainable future for MIT?

Opportunity

Do you have facilitation, human-centered design, or community engagement skills? Are you fascinated by the opportunity to explore how AI might weave into civic and political life? Do you want to learn how groups make decisions collectively on difficult topics? Join our team at the MIT Center for Constructive Communication during IAP to implement a Tech-Enhanced Student Assembly as a model for reimagining constructive communication and democratic deliberation for –and with– students at MIT.

Dates: 01.14.2025-01.31.2025
Pay: $16/hour
Contact: mrna@media.mit.edu

Apply Now >

Discussion Topic

MIT’s commitment to achieving a zero-carbon campus by 2050, with an interim goal of net-zero emissions by 2026, underscores the urgency of implementing effective sustainability initiatives. What policies or initiatives should MIT prioritize to enhance campus sustainability and meet its climate commitments? The assembly aims to generate actionable recommendations that position MIT as a leader in campus sustainability and serve as a model for other institutions.

More about Student Assemblies

This Model Student Assembly (similar to Model UN) will offer a hands-on, experiential learning opportunity for MIT students to learn about and deliberate through a simulation of a Tech-Enhanced Student Assembly. Through this experience, participating MIT students will immerse themselves in ancient and proven facilitation and deliberation practices, understand the benefits of institutionalizing them, and explore how technology can connect Assemblies to broader public engagement. All sessions will be recorded to allow for our team to analyze the quality of the deliberation and understand how technology can support and enhance deliberative practices.

“I was pleased and impressed with the quality of the discussions and recommendations. I didn’t have any particular expectation around the quality of the recommendations we’d write at the start of the IAP but rather was interested in the migration from polarity to wholeness and respect for other human beings and their unique experiences, and the positive outcomes that result from groups working from the same (curated/valid/thoughtful) information set.”

A participant from our 2024 Student Assembly

More about Citizens’ Assemblies

A Citizens’ Assembly is a group of people selected by sortition (lottery) who are broadly representative of a community. They spend significant time learning about a topic and then collaborating through facilitated deliberation to find common ground and form collective recommendations for policy makers, decision makers, and the community. Citizens’ Assemblies have convened (and influenced policy changes) on a number of topics including end-of-life care, biodiversity, and climate change amongst many other diverse topics.

You can read more about CCC’s work on Tech-Enhanced Deliberative Assemblies as well as about the Student Assembly we implemented during IAP 2024.

Responsibilities

  • Join a one hour pre-event conversation on the topic of the Assembly
  • Receive training in how to host inclusive conversations and facilitating deliberation amongst students with diverging opinions
  • Respond to surveys pre, during and after the assembly
  • Attending all 3 full days of the Student Assembly, either as a participant or a facilitator (meals included!)
  • Assist the research team to mic up and record the voices of all participants during the assembly as well as diarizing these after the event
  • Debrief the event to provide feedback on survey tools and the utility of AI for enhancing the deliberation process

We will be recruiting 20 UROPs for IAP. UROP obligations will last for 3 weeks between January 14-31 for 10-15 hours a week; UROPs must commit to three full in-person days on January 23 and 24 as well as January 30 for the actual Student Assembly which will take place at the MIT Media Lab; other work can be done remotely for approximately 10-15 hours/week. All UROPs are paid $16/hour.

Apply by 12/22/2024 to be considered for the opportunity!

Questions? Email mrna@media.mit.edu