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The ADVANCE program has announced that three research teams are recipients of ADVANCE Collaborative Research Seed Grants for 2020-21. These competitive grants aim to foster the development of innovative and equitable collaborative research projects among faculty. Recognizing longstanding gender gaps in the academy, the National Science Foundation (NSF) funds universities to build institutional transformation programs in order to advance gender equity for faculty in science and engineering. Through the power of collaboration, ADVANCE cultivates faculty equity and inclusion—especially for women and minorities in science and engineering. Three winning teams demonstrated innovative research and well thought-out and equitable collaborations.

Pari Riahi, assistant professor in the Department of Architecture, is a member of one of the winning teams, along with Narges Mahyar and Ali Sarvghad from the college of information and computer sciences. Their team will be exploring “Mapping Instability: The Effects of the Pandemic on the Civic Life of a Small Town.”

This project investigates the impacts of the current pandemic on Amherst residents' civic lives, focusing on mobility, access to collective resources, sense of community, and social connectedness within the town's physical and architectural confines. Collecting rich data from the public is vital for this goal. In-person public data collection methods such as interviews and focus groups are infeasible due to the current crisis. There has been a proliferation of online data collection and public engagement platforms. While online platforms broaden access and increase engagement, they cannot support and sustain dialogue to encourage people to provide deeper insights into their needs and issues. The team will co-design an innovative conversational chatbot that approximates a live conversation. This project makes collected data accessible through equitable channels to citizens and policymakers. It builds upon previous interdisciplinary collaboration that joins forces from Architecture and Computer Science disciplines, fusing research on adaptive reuse, digital civics, and visualization. The team will offer a new model for synergistic and synchronized gathering and transfer of data and its use as it is reflected back to civic society and the city's architectural and urban environment.