The National Science Foundation (NSF) this week launched a new $16 million program that seeks to ensure ethical, legal, community, and societal considerations are embedded in the lifecycle of technology’s creation and use.
The Responsible Design, Development and Deployment of Technologies (ReDDDoT) program – launched in collaboration with five philanthropic partners on Jan. 9 – aims to help create technologies that promote the public’s wellbeing and mitigate potential harm.
According to NSF, the ReDDDoT program invites proposals from multidisciplinary, multi-sector teams that examine and demonstrate the principles, methodologies, and impacts associated with responsible design, development, and deployment of technologies – especially those specified in the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022. NSF said the initial areas of focus for 2024 include AI, biotechnology, or natural and anthropogenic disaster prevention or mitigation.
“The design, development and deployment of technologies have broad impacts on society,” NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan said in a statement. “As discoveries and innovations are translated to practice, it is essential that we engage and enable diverse communities to participate in this work. NSF and its philanthropic partners share a strong commitment to creating a comprehensive approach for co-design through soliciting community input, incorporating community values and engaging a broad array of academic and professional voices across the lifecycle of technology creation and use.”
NSF said that the new program has five broad goals for the design, development, and deployment of technologies:
- Stimulating activity and filling gaps in research, innovation, and capacity building
- Creating broad and inclusive communities of interest that bring together key stakeholders;
- Educating and training the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics workforce;
- Accelerating pathways to societal and economic benefits while developing strategies to avoid or mitigate societal and economic harms; and
- Empowering communities to participate in all stages of technology development.
Phase 1 of the program solicits proposals for workshops, planning grants, or the creation of translational research coordination networks, while Phase 2 solicits full project proposals, NSF said.
More specifically, Phase 1 of ReDDDoT will fund 28 to 36 awards: 10 to 12 planning grants – up to $300,000 each for no more than two years; two translational research coordination networks – up to $500,000 each for three to four years; and eight to 10 workshops – up to $75,000 each. Applications are due April 8.
Phase 2 will fund an estimated eight to 12 project proposals at $750,000 to $1.5 million each for three years. Applications are due April 22.
In addition to NSF, the program is funded and supported by the Ford Foundation, the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, Pivotal Ventures, Siegel Family Endowment, and the Eric and Wendy Schmidt Fund for Strategic Innovation.
“In recognition of the role responsible technologists can play to advance human progress, and the danger unaccountable technology poses to social justice, the ReDDDoT program serves as both a collaboration and a covenant between philanthropy and government to center public interest technology into the future of progress,” said Darren Walker, president of the Ford Foundation. “This $16 million initiative will cultivate expertise from public interest technologists across sectors who are rooted in community and grounded by the belief that innovation, equity and ethics must equally be the catalysts for technological progress.”
NSF will be hosting a webinar on Feb. 9 at 2 p.m. EST for more information about ReDDDoT.
