CAREER: A Community-based Approach to Empowered Information and Communication Technology Infrastructure Measurement

该奖项全部或部分由《2021年美国救援计划法案》（公法117-2）资助。该研究将开发设计和评估信息和通信技术（ICT）测量工作的方法，从而使部署工作能够对其打算服务的公民负责。虽然联邦政府已经做出了一些努力来增加美国各地宽带基础设施的部署，但许多社区似乎一直被排除在这些部署努力的影响之外。对移动宽带技术的这些不平等现象进行量化尤其具有挑战性。目前，政府补贴的宽带部署工作依赖于提供商生成的覆盖地图，该地图使用无线电传播模型来演示跨空间移动宽带可用的位置。对这些地图的特别调查显示，传播模型大大夸大了信息和通信技术基础设施的渗透，并指出需要对信息和通信技术基础设施进行广泛的测量，以更好地评估覆盖的真实程度。随着信息和通信技术基础设施对教育、保健、银行和公民参与等基本服务越来越重要，准确评估信息和通信技术基础设施的可及性变得至关重要。为了以揭示不平等的方式大规模衡量ICT基础设施，有必要依靠对ICT基础设施的众包衡量。本研究旨在回答推动ICT基础设施政策制定和部署的两个基本问题：我们如何知道ICT基础设施部署工作实际上正在改善ICT基础设施的访问，以及如何设计ICT测量的众包平台，以确保众包ICT测量工作产生具有代表性的数据？研究活动将在三个连续的方面寻求答案：(1)围绕ICT测量和绘图的概念化的民族志调查；(2)创新测量平台的设计与实现；(3)测量平台的部署与评估。对这些研究中收集的数据进行荟萃分析，最终将形成一个可转移的设计理论，用于包容性众包ICT测量。此外，教育活动将与研究协同工作，通过包容性的基于问题的课程设计和通过混合方法的社会技术研究方法指导学生，扩大对计算机的参与。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2). The research will develop methods by which to design and evaluate information and communication technology (ICT) measurement efforts such that deployment efforts can be held accountable to the citizens they are intended to serve. While there have been several federal efforts to increase the deployment of broadband infrastructure across the United States, many communities seem to be persistently excluded from the impacts of these deployment efforts. It can be especially challenging to quantify these inequities for mobile broadband technologies. Currently, government subsidized broadband deployment efforts rely on provider-generated coverage maps, which use radio propagation models to demonstrate where mobile broadband is available across space. Ad hoc investigations of these maps have revealed that propagation models substantially overstate the penetration of ICT infrastructure and point to a need for widespread measurements of ICT infrastructure to better assess the true extent of coverage. As ICT infrastructure becomes increasingly necessary for essential services such as education, healthcare, banking, and civic participation, accurate assessment of ICT infrastructure accessibility becomes essential. To measure ICT infrastructure at scale and in a manner that illuminates inequities, it is necessary to rely on crowdsourced measurements of ICT infrastructure. This research seeks to answer two fundamental questions that drive ICT infrastructure policymaking and deployments: How do we know that ICT infrastructure deployment efforts are actually improving access to ICT infrastructure and how should crowdsourcing platforms for ICT measurements be designed in order to ensure that representative data are generated by crowdsourced ICT measurement efforts? Research activities will seek answers in three successive strands: (1) an ethnographic investigation of conceptualizations around ICT measurement and mapping; (2) the design and implementation of an innovative measurement platform; and, (3) the deployment and evaluation of the measurement platform. Meta-analysis of data collected in each of these research strands will culminate in a transferable theory of design for inclusive crowdsourced ICT measurements. Moreover, education activities will work synergistically with the research to broaden participation in computing through inclusive problem-based curricular design and mentoring students through mixed-methods sociotechnical research approaches.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.