There will be one million unfilled technical jobs in 2020. There are 2,220,300 people in the U.S. prison system. Opportunity Through Data hopes to address this gap in human capital while simultaneously reducing recidivism rates in California prisons and increasing the number of women, especially minority women, in technical roles. The project is centered around a ten week certificate course on data science for inmates who have attained their high school diploma or GED. The course, taught by university students and industry volunteers, will connect women to lucrative data analysis jobs upon release from prison. Throughout the course, participants will learn statistics and computer science, and they will complete projects that can be used to bolster their resumes upon release. Opportunity Through Data will develop key industry partnerships to place program graduates in jobs, thus reducing recidivism.
Currently at UC Berkeley marginalized students receive little to no mentorship or resources to conduct research. Students of color perform low rates of research and campus research programs have low acceptance rates of underrepresented students. Of the 54 undergraduate research programs on campus, 12 are directly for first-generation, low-income, historically underrepresented students – however these programs often have limited resources to offer and/or limited space. Mentorship for underrepresented students is also lacking, with university faculty consisting of few scholars of color. Through a series of workshops, UROC will equip students with key skillsets for conducting research, including: designing research questions, creating literature reviews, analyzing primary archives, and designing methodologies.
The Youth Empowerment Program (YEP) aims to provide a network of support and hope to immigrant children held in federal custody by connecting them to student role models from the University of California. YEP uses a five-month curriculum to help detained youth develop teamwork and leadership skills, reflect upon their past and make positive plans for their future while connecting with college student mentors. YEP provides an extensive leadership training program for volunteers by bringing in experts in diverse fields with the purpose of building future leaders for social justice. YEP volunteers utilize their leadership immediately by working with detained unaccompanied immigrant children every other week and engaging in direct community outreach. (Note: This project originally won in the Big Ideas “Social Justice & Community Engagement” category.)
Access to standard lab equipment is a serious limitation to scientific education, research and capacity building in many parts of the world. To combat this problem, Tekla Labs aims to empower scientists and engineers to construct their own quality lab equipment from locally available supplies using detailed and reliable protocols. While many real-world examples of doit-yourself (DIY) equipment already exist, quality assurance and comprehensive instructions on how to build education and research grade lab equipment are lacking. To address this, Tekla Labs is creating an interactive online library of tested “How-To” blueprints. All equipment instructions will be freely available under an unrestricted creative commons license to allow users throughout the world to use and add to Tekla Labs. The interactive online forum will allow researchers to ask questions and make requests, share their own improvements and alternative solutions, and connect to other labs worldwide.
(Note: This project originally won in the Big Ideas “Social Entrepreneurship” category.)
