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The Work in the Age of Intelligent Machines (WAIM) Research Coordination Network is
pleased to announce the WAIM Doctoral Research Fellowship program—a competition that aims
to recognize and support outstanding graduate research related to the convergence of
intelligent machines and the future of work. With funding from the National Science
Foundation’s Future of Work at the Human-Technology
Frontier<https://www.nsf.gov/eng/futureofwork.jsp> initiative, this fellowship
program will confer a select number of $50,000 awards to eligible US doctoral students to
enable them to focus solely on their research during the 2021–2022 academic year. In
sponsoring this program, we hope to identify the next set of leaders in building the deep
and systematic knowledge required to simultaneously consider the technical, individual,
group, organizational, and societal issues involved in leveraging today’s expanding
technological capabilities to serve both work and workers.
Eligible candidates for this program are late-stage students enrolled in a research-based
doctoral program at an accredited US-institution who are engaged in research that embraces
the future of work as a socio-technological phenomenon—one that requires attention to both
social and technological systems as well as the implications of their interdependencies.
Addressing this challenge requires a research approach that expands beyond a delimited
focus on autonomous systems qua systems and instead endorses a convergent approach, namely
“the deep integration of knowledge, techniques, and expertise from multiple fields to form
new and expanded frameworks” (NSF, 2017). As such, we welcome candidates who draw on a
wide variety of disciplinary perspectives, including labor studies, law, psychology,
computer science, management science, policy studies, anthropology, sociology, learning
science, and cognitive science, among others.
Future WAIM Fellows will interact as a cohort to enable peer exchange and learning. The
cohort will come together physically at two meetings during the 2021-22 academic year. The
first will be a kickoff event, currently planned for September 2021 in Manhattan. The
second event will be during the summer of 2022 at the final WAIM Convergence Conference
(location tbd). We will also require that each Fellow attend the dissertation defense of
at least 2 peer Fellows virtually and will encourage each Fellow to open any public
presentation of their research to other members of the cohort as well as members of the
larger WAIM network.
Fellowship applications will be evaluated in relation to their potential for intellectual
merit, broader impact, and resonance with the WAIM RCN mission and
theme<https://waim.network/about>. For the purpose of this call, we define ‘work’ as
the mental or physical activity to achieve tangible benefit such as income, profit, or
community welfare. We use the phrase ‘intelligent machines’ to refer to computing
technologies characterized by autonomy, the ability to learn, and the ability to interact
with other systems and with humans. The first cohort of WAIM Fellows will be announced in
early August 2021.
To apply, please submit the following materials on the online reviewing
system<https://syracuse.infoready4.com/#competitionDetail/1845709> by 15 July 2021
(midnight EDT):
1. Application summarizing a) current thesis status and expected timeline for
completion (i.e., dissertation defense), b) potential intellectual merit and broader
impact of dissertation research relative to the WAIM RCN theme and
goals<https://waim.network/about>, c) thesis committee members and d) agreement to
eligibility requirements.
2. A 2500-word summary of dissertation research (not including references).
3. Current CV.
4. Letter of recommendation from dissertation advisor, including confirmation of
dissertation research timeline and eligibility for the fellowship.
Please direct any questions to Kevin Crowston, Ingrid Erickson or Jeff Nickerson at
fellowship@waim.network<mailto:fellowship@waim.network>.
Download this call as a PDF<https://waim.network/fellowshippdf>.
Kevin Crowston
Associate Dean for Research, Distinguished Professor of Information Science
School of Information Studies
Editor-in-chief ACM Transactions on Social Computing and Information, Technology &
People
+1 (315) 443.1676<tel:+1%20(315)%20443.1676>
crowston@syr.edu<mailto:crowston@syr.edu>
348 Hinds Hall, Syracuse, NY 13244
crowston.syr.edu<http://crowston.syr.edu/>
Syracuse University
Most recent publications:
Eseryel, U. Y., Crowston, K., & Heckman, R.. (In press). Functional and visionary
leadership in self-managing virtual teams. Group & Organization Management. doi:
10.1177/1059601120955034
Jackson, C. B., Østerlund, C., Harandi, M., Crowston, K., & Trouille, L. (2020).
Shifting forms of presence: Volunteer learning in online citizen science. Proceedings
of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, (CSCW), 36. doi: 10.1145/3392841
Eseryel, U. Y., Wei, K., & Crowston, K. (2020). Decision-making processes in
community-based free/libre open source software development teams with internal
governance: An extension to decision-making theory. Communications of the Association for
Information Systems, 46. doi: 10.17705/1CAIS.04620
Jackson, C., Østerlund, C., Crowston, K., Harandi, M., Allen, S., Bahaadini, S., et al.
(2020). Teaching citizen scientists to categorize glitches using machine-learning-guided
training. Computers In Human Behavior, 105, 106198. doi: 10.1016/j.chb.2019.106198
Check out our research coordination network on Work in the Age of Intelligent Machine:
http://waim.network/