PInT is a community of students learning how to serve the public interest by creating an engineering practice that centers care, equity, and a critical understanding of the systemic injustices that our work seeks to address.
During the school year, PInT members have the opportunity to join student-led teams to work on various semester-long PIT projects. These projects help students gain interdisciplinary skills and real world experience in fields such as education, mechanical engineering, software engineering, user-oriented design, and more.
Improving ASR models to better recognize stuttered speech by reducing bias and enhancing performance. The team submitted their research to the AAAS e-poster competition.
Developing a system to faciliate safe, reliable, and coordinated transportation for the elderly and those with cognitive or developmental disabilities.
Developing a low-cost grain thresher to support local farmers. Students work with farms to test and refine engineering solutions for everyday needs.
Coordinating sub-teams using the AGILE framework, this group teaches project management skills and prepares members to pitch engineering ideas effectively.
Public Interest Technology (PIT) is an emerging field focusing on educating engineers, designers, computer and data scientists, and others to work in service of the public good.
Public interest technologists apply their technical knowledge and understanding of its social and political implications to promote the general public.
"Public interest technology refers to the study and application of technology expertise to advance the public interest/generate public benefits/promote the public good."
- Defining Public Interest Technology from New America
Olin is a founding member of the Public Interest Technology University Network (PIT-UN), a major initiative led by New America, the Ford Foundation, and the Hewlett Foundation.
"The Public Interest Technology University Network is a partnership that fosters collaboration between universities and colleges committed to building the nascent field of public interest technology and growing a new generation of civic-minded technologists. Through the development of curricula, research agendas, and experiential learning programs in the public interest technology space, these universities are trying innovative tactics to produce graduates with multiple fluencies at the intersection of technology and policy. By joining PIT-UN, members commit to field building on campus."
- New America
PInT is the student-run public interest technology (PIT) organization at Olin College of Engineering