The Public Interest Technology University Network (PIT-UN) Challenge seeks to encourage new ideas, foster collaborations, and incentivize the sharing of resources and information among a national network of universities working to create a robust public interest technology field.
More information regarding Penn State's participation in PIT-UN is available in this PSU News story. Faculty and students interested in learning more about the Penn State PIT Alliance and joining this community of students, scholars and practitioners in PIT should sign up here.
The PIT University Network Challenge
The Public Interest Technology University Network (PIT-UN) Challenge is a unique program that drives equitable innovation in technology across academia, government, industry and civil society. Since 2019, the Challenge has deployed over $15 million to build new courses, research centers, community and government partnerships, certificates and degrees, internships, fellowships and more.
In 2023, 14 grants totaling $1.5 million were awarded to further develop a research community and workforce as passionate about public interest as they are about developing breakthrough technologies.
In 2024, the Challenge will build on this foundation by focusing on two specific areas:
- Educational offerings that foster cross-disciplinary perspectives and credentialing.
- Career pipeline/placement efforts to develop a public interest technology workforce in government, industry, and social impact organizations.
Project themes may include:
- Environmental, climate, or sustainability projects that provide for opportunities for storytelling around the importance of PIT.
- Policy projects with state and local governmental partnership research or briefs that advance PIT in these key fields: data science, artificial intelligence (AI), or quantum computing.
- Technical projects where students and researchers explicitly engage in storytelling about PIT within the work (Quantum, AI, augmented analytics, machine learning, robotics).
- Democracy and voting projects that explore ways to strengthen public interest systems and broaden participation at the local, state, and federal government levels.
- The intersection of gender and technology in the pursuit of justice and equity.
Projects may include:
- Multi-institutional research projects focused on artificial intelligence, quantum computing, or data science.
- Public interest technology certifications, noncredit professional development opportunities, and degree completion projects for all levels of students
- New models of career training, placement, and/or financial support to develop the public interest technology workforce.
- Partnerships with nonprofit, private sector, or affinity groups to educate current working professionals in public interest technology.
- Experiential learning opportunities that give students real-world exposure to the practice of public interest technology for undergraduate students.
- Experiential opportunities, including clinics, labs, internships, or apprenticeships at the undergraduate level.
- Fellowships with an expressed goal of inter-institutional research or dissemination.
- Toolkits and guides that include granular instructions to replicate initiatives yet are not case studies in implementations.
- Guides should focus on tenure, internships, and hackathons.
The PIT-UN Challenge will prioritize projects that center on the needs of communities that have historically been denied access to new technologies, systematically left out of conversations at the intersection of technology and policy or denied opportunities to join the technology workforce. PIT-UN will prioritize these projects to further the positive social impact of technology for all communities. Projects may demonstrate centering community needs by creating a space for communities to play a role in shaping technology development. Successful applications will meet the follow criteria.
- Have meaningful and equitable partnerships with one or more of the following entities:
- Other educational institutions outside of the PIT-UN network, in particular minority serving institutions, or serve communities historically denied access to technology, and two-year community colleges.
- Have project teams that indicate clearly how project objectives and methods and actional plans will address racial, ethnic, linguistic, and socioeconomic impediments that have existed historically so that the entire community can be served.
- Community organizations that have a specific focus on workforce development and/or creating career pathways for populations currently underrepresented in public service or in the science, technology, engineering, or math fields.
- Have project objectives and methods to address the articulated barriers and gaps for historically marginalized groups and address aspects of racial, ethnic, linguistic, and socioeconomic impediments are reflected in the design and reach of the project (i.e., students served) as well as the staffing of the proposed project team.
- Have a project team that demonstrates the ability to serve ethnically, racially, socioeconomically diverse, and underrepresented populations, perhaps supported by an actionable plan informed by best practices to use this funding to engage and serve these populations.
PIT-UN is inviting proposals in two funding tranches. Budgets should be inclusive of an indirect rate, set at 20% of total direct costs.
- Up to $90,000 ($0-$90,000) for direct and indirect costs
- Up to $180,000 ($90,001-$180,000) for direct and indirect costs which shall be in collaboration with the Law, Policy and Engineering initiative
- Proposals requesting Tranche 2 funding must include at least 50% in-kind contribution funding from the primary institution.
There is a limit to the number of proposals a PIT-UN Network university can submit:
- Network members can submit a total of three proposals for new projects.
- Only one proposal can fall within Tranche 2: Up to $180,000 ($90,001-$180,000) for direct and indirect costs.
- Network members can also submit any number of proposals for additional funding to continue and/or scale a previously funded project.*
- Any number of these can fall within Tranche 2: Up to $180,000 ($90,001-$180,000) for direct and indirect costs.
- If you are applying for continued funding on an existing project you need not respond to this limited submission call.
Interested applicants should upload the following documents in sequence in one PDF file (File name: [Last name]_PIT-UN_2024) no later than 4:00 p.m. on the internal submission deadline:
1. Cover Page(1 page, pdf):
- Descriptive title of proposed activity
- PI name, departmental affiliations(s) and contact information
- Co-PI's and practitioner names and departmental affiliation(s)
- Names of other key personnel
- Participating institution(s)
- Title of this funding opportunity
- Funding tranche
2. Project Description (no more than three pages, pdf) identifying the project scope that addresses the following components (for details see RFP)
- Project Plan
- Impact
- Network Impact
- Institutional Support
- Partnerships (internal or external partnerships (current or planned))
- Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
3. 2-page CV's of Investigators and Practitioners
Formatting Guidelines:
Font/size: no smaller than 11 pt.
Document margins: 1.0” (top, bottom, left and right)
Standard paper size (8 ½” x 11)
The Office of Foundation Relations and PIT-UN are the designated institutional contacts responsible for communicating to the PIT-UN. For questions concerning the application process and other Network-related questions, applicants should please contact Andrew Kuhn, Assistant Director, Foundation Relations (andrew.kuhn@psu.edu) for additional support.