Project Description

Weinberg’s project during the AIAS-SHAPE Democracy and Digital Citizenship Fellowship will evaluate the development of smart campus initiatives in Denmark and Scotland in comparison to the US and assess the impact of these initiatives on the privacy rights, working conditions, and academic freedom of students and faculty. She plans to focus her efforts on the connections between smart campus and smart city initiatives, using case studies of smart campus initiatives that are explicitly designed to serve as proving grounds for smart city technology. These initiatives hold tremendous promise for improving student learning and maximizing the environmental sustainability of universities. However, in practice, they can vastly expand the powers of industry over higher education while raising pressing concerns about privacy and autonomy from unwarranted institutional oversight. To what extent do the social, political, and historical contexts of Denmark and Scotland shape smart campus initiatives in ways that are similar to, and/or different from, US smart campus initiatives? How might the comparison of these initiatives help inform visions of ethical approaches to smart campus development? 

Short Bio

Lindsay Weinberg is a clinical assistant professor in the John Martinson Honors College and Director of the Tech Justice Lab at Purdue University. Her research and teaching are at the intersection of science and technology studies, media studies, and feminist studies, with an emphasis on the social and ethical impacts of digital technology. Her book Smart University: Student Surveillance in the Digital Age examines the proliferation of digital tools for higher education governance, and their impacts on marginalized people within and beyond the university’s walls.